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ShaMPeare's •:• 
• King Henry V. 



Kellogg. 




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English Classics, 

FOR 

Glasr'^'^ '" f-" o"/'^/? / tfi^rnfijiTf^. RfiinHinp-. Grammar, etc. 



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and Litera- 
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English scholars. W e are confldent tnat teacners 

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English Classics, 

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Classes in English Literature, Reading,Grammar, etc. 

EDITED BT EMINENT ENGLISH AND AMERICAN SCHOLARS. 

I^ach Volume contains a Sketch of the Aulhor'^s Life, Prefatory and 
Explanatory Notes, etc., etc. 

1 Byron's Prophecy of Dante. (Cantos T. and II.) 

2 Milton's L'AUegro and II Penseroso. 

3 Lord Bacon's Essays, Civil and Moral. (Selected.) 

4 Byron's Prisoner of Chillon. 

5 Moore's Fire-Worshippers. (Lalla Rookh. Selected from Parts 

I. and II.) 

6 Goldsmith's Deserted Village. 

7 Scott's Marmion. -(Selections from Canto VI.) 

8 Scott's Lay of the Last Minstrel. (Introduction and Canto I.) 

9 Burns' Cotter's Saturday Night, and other Poems. 

10 Crabbe's The Village. 

11 Campbell's Pleasures of Hope. (Abridgment of Part I) 

12 Macaulay's Essay on Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. 

13 Macaulays Armada, and other Poems. 

14 Shake sp' ares Merchant of Venice. (Selections from Acts I., III. 
and IV.) 

Goldsmith's Traveller. 
Hogg's Queens Wake. (Selections.) 
Coleridge's Ancient Mariner. 
Addison's Sir Roger de Coverley. 
Gray's Elegy in a Country Churchyard. 
Scott's Lady of the Lake. (Canto I.) 
Shakespeare's As You Like It, etc. (Selections.) 
Shakespeare's King John and King Richard II. (Selections.) 
Shakespeare's King Henry IV., King Henry V., King Henry VL 
(Selections.) 

24 Shakespeare's Henry VIIL, and Julius Caesar. (Selections.) 

25 Wordsworth's Excursion. (Book I.) 

26 Pope's Essay on Criticism. 

27 Spenser's Faerie Queene. (Cantos I. and II.) 

28 Cowper'sTask. (BookL) 

29 Milton's Comus. 

30 Tennyson's Enoch Arden. 

31 Irving' s Sketch Book. (Selections.) 

32 Dickens' Christmas Carol. (Abridged.) 

33 Carlyle's Hero as a Prophet. 

34 Macaulay's Essay on Warren Hastings. (Abridged.) 

35 Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield. (Abridged.) 

From 32 to 48 Pages each. 16mo. Others iu Preparation. 

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SHAKESPEARE'S \^ 

King Henry V. 

WITH 

NOTES, EXAMINATION PAPERS, AND PLAN 
OF PREPARATION. 

(selected.) 

By BRAINERD KELLOGG, A.M., 

Professor of the English Language and Literature in tJie 

Brooklyn Collegiate and Polytechnic Institute, and author 

of a''' Text-Bookon Rhetoric,'''' a " Tebct-Book on English 

Literature^'''' and one of the authors of Reed &r 

Kellogg's ""Graded Lessons in English^"' 

and '■''Higher Lessons in English.^' 




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SHAKESPEARE'S PlaYS, 

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UniJ'ortn in siyle and price iviih this volume^ 

MERCHANT OF VENICE. 

KING HENRY V. 

AS YOU LIKE IT. 

JULIUS C^^SAP. 

KING LEAR. 

MACBETH. 

TEMPEST. 

HAMLET. 



Copyright, 1883, 
By CLARK & MAYNARD. 



EDITOR'S NOTE. 



The text here presented, adapted for use in mixed 
classes, has been carefully collated with that of six or seven 
of the latest and best editions. Where there was any dis- 
agreement those readings have been adopted which 
seemed most recisonable and were supported by the best 
authority. 

Professor Meiklejohn's exhaustive notes form the sub- 
stance of those here used ; and his plan, as set forth in 
the "General Notice" annexed, has been carried out in 
these volumes. But as these plays are intended rather for 
pupils in school and college than for ripe Shakespearian 
scholars, we have not hesitated to prune his notes of what- 
ever was thought to be too learned for our purpose, or 
on other grounds was deemed irrelevant to it. The note^ 
of other EngUsh editors have been freely incorporated. 

B. K. 



GENERAL NOTICE. 



•' An attempt has been made in these new editions to 
interpret Shakespeare by the aid of Shakespeare himself. 
The Method of Comparison has been constantly employ- 
ed ; and the language used by him in one place has been 
compared with the language used in other places in simi- 
lar circumstances, as well as with older English and witli 
newer English. The text has been as carefully and as 
thoroughly annotated as the text of any Greek or Latin 
classic. 

"The first purpose in this elaborate annotation is, of 
course the full working out of Shakespeare's meaning. 
The Editor has in all circumstances taken as much pains 
with this as if he had been making out the difficult and 
obscure terms of a will in which he himself was personally 
interested ; and he submits that this thorough excavation 
of the meaning of a really profound thinker is one of the 
very best kinds of training that a boy or girl can receive at 
school. This is to read the very mind of Shakespeare, and 
to weave his thoughts into the fibre of one's own mental 
constitution. And always new rewards come to the care- 
ful reader — in the shape of new meanings, recognition of 
5 



tlioughts he had before missed, of relations between the 
characters that had hitherto escaped him. For reading 
Shakespeare is just Hke examining Nature ; there are no 
hollownesses, there is no scamped work, for Shakespeare 
is as patiently exact and as first-hand as Nature herself. 

"Besides this thorough working-out of Shakespeare's 
meaning, advantage has been taken of the opportunity to 
teach his English — to make each play an introduction to 
the English of Shakespeare. For this purpose copi- 
ous collections of similar phrases have been gathered from 
other plays ; his idioms have been dwelt upon ; his pecu- 
liar use of words ; his style and his rhythm. Son:e 
Teachers may consider that too many instances are given ; 
but, in teaching, as in everything else, the old French say- 
ing is true : Assez «'_y a, s'tl t?-op ii'y a. The Teacher 
need not require each pupil to give him all the instances 
collected. If each gives one or two, it will probably bo 
enough ; and, among them all, it is certain that one or two 
will stick in the memory. It is probable that, for those pu- 
pils who do not study either Greek or Latin, this close ex- 
amination of every word and phrase in the text of Shake- 
speare will be the best substitute that can be found for the 
study of the ancient classics. 

" It were much to be hoped that Shakespeare should 
become more and more of a study, and that every boy 
and girl should have a thorough knowledge of at least one 
play of Shakespeare before leaving school. It would be 
one of the best lessons in human life, without the chanca 
of a polluting or degrading experience. It would also 
have the effect of bringing back into the too pale and for- 
mal Enghsh of modern times a large number of pithy and 



vigorous phrases which would help to develop as well as 
to reflect vigor in the characters of the readers. Shake- 
speare used the English language with more power than 
any other writer that ever lived — he made it do more and 
say more than it had ever done ; he made it speak in a 
more original way ; and his combinations of words are per- 
petual provocations and invitations to originality and to 
newness of insight." — ^J. M. D. Meiklejohn, M.A., 
Professor of the Theory^ History, and Practice of Educa- 
tion in tJie University of St. Andrews. 



PLAN OF STUDY 



perfp:ct possession/ 



To attain to the standard of ^ Perfect Pos- 
session,' the reader ought to have an inti- 
mate and ready knowledge of the subject. 
(See opposite page.) 

The student ought, first of all, to read the 
play as a pleasure ; then to read it over again, 
with his mind upon the characters and the 
plot ; and lastly, to read it for the meanings, 
grammar, &c. 

With the help of the scheme, he can easily 
draw up for himself short examination papers 
(i) on each scene, (2) on each act, (3) on 
the whole play. (See page 149.) 



1. The Plot and Story of the Play. 

(a) The general plot ; 
(d) The special incidents. 

2. The Characters : Ability to give a connected account 

of all that is done and most of what is said by- 
each character in the play. 

3. The Influence and Interplay of the Characters upon 

each other. 

(a) Relation of A to B and of B to A ; 
(d) Relation of A to C and D. 

4. Complete Possession of the Language. 

(a) Meanings of words ; 

{l>) Use of old words, or of words in an old mean- 
ing ; 

(c) Grammar ; 

(d) Ability to quote lines to i'lustrate a gram- 

matical point. 
6. Power to Reproduce, or Quote. 

(a) What was said by A or B on a particular 

occasion ; 
(d) What was said by A in reply to B ; 

(c) What argument was used by C at a particu- 

lar juncture ; 

(d) To quote a line in instance of an idiom or of 

a peculiar meaning. 
6. Power to Locate. 

(a) To attribute a line or statement to a certain 

person on a certain occasion ; 
(d) To cap a line ; 
(c) To fill in the right word or epithet. 



INTRODUCTION TO KING HENRY V. 



In the Epilogue to Khig Henry IV., Pari II., it is 
said, " If you be not too much cloyed with fat meat, 
our humble author will continue the story, with Sir John 
in it, and make you merry with fair Katharine of France ; " 
and in the play of King Hejiry V. we have the fulfil- 
ment of the dramatist's promise. The stage was already 
in possession of a play entitled The famous Victories of 
Henjy the Fifth, but Shakespeare made no use of this in 
the composition of his play. He drew largely for the 
historical facts upon the Chronicles of Ho Unshed, a second 
edition of which had been issued in 1587. 

The date of the composition of King Henry V. would 
seem to be 1599. It is not mentioned by Meres in his 
Palladis Tamia, 1598 ; but that it was written shortly 
afterward may be inferred from a passage of the Chorus 
before Act V., which evidently refers to Lord Essex, 
who was sent on an expedition to Ireland, April 15, 1599, 
and returned to London on the 28th of September in the 
same year. 

The reign of Henry V, extended over a period of 

10 



introduction: n 

somewhat more than nine years and five months. It 
began on the 2ist of March, 1413, and terminated with 
his death at Bois de Vincennes, in France, on the 31st of 
August, 1422 — 

" Small time, but in that small most greatly liv'd 
This star of England ! "' 

-Shakespeare felt how very inadequate a theatrical repre- 
sentation was to portray the great events and martial 
glories of Henry's reign ; and both in the Prologue and 
in the concluding address of the Chorus he makes apolo- 
getic reference to the subject. Henry V. was one of the 
most popular, as he was among the bravest, of English 
monarchs. As a conqueror he was stern and ambitious, 
but not cruel, and won over his enemies by tact and clem- 
ency. The splendid victory at Agincourt embalmed his 
name and memory; and, for generations after his death, 
his magnificent tomb in Westminster Abbey, surmounted 
by his bruised helmet and shield, was regarded with tha 
honor and reverence paid to sainted relics. 

Shakespeare begins his drama with the conferences 
relative to Henry's pretensions to the crown of France, 
and the operation of the Salique law. The monarch's 
claim, as the representative of Isabella, wife of Edward 
II,, was in reality inadmissible and absurd ; but France 
was then in a wretched condition, burdened with an im- 
becile monarch, and torn by factions, Henry was ambi- 
tious and warlike, and the English were ever ready for 



1 2 IN TROD UCTION. 

arms and conquest. Ambassadors from the Dauphin ap- 
peared, and fruitless negotiations were entered into, at 
the close of which Henry announced to his great council 
at Westminster, in April, 141 5, that it was his firm pur- 
pose to make a voyage in his own proper person, "by 
the grace of God, to recover his inheritance." The poet 
touches upon the treasonable conspiracy of the Earl of 
Cambridge to place his brother-in-law, Edmund Mortimer, 
Earl of March, on the throne, in which Cambridge was 
joined by Lord Scroop and Sir Thomas Grey ; but the - 
plot failed, and the conspirators were condemned to the 
block. This abortive effort retarded but slightly the ex- 
pedition against France, and Henry with his victorious 
soldiers was soon scaling the wall of Harfleur. The bat- 
tle of Agincourt follows, preluded by a series of stirring 
incidents, and by speeches breathing martial ardor and un- 
daunted courage ; and the great victory is described with 
the utmost dramatic effect and with strong national feel- 
ing. The calm heroism and devotion of the English are 
contrasted with the levity and overweening confidence of 
the French ; and, as the latter were numerically as five 
to one, the English might be pardoned for some national 
vanity and exultation at the result. After this, we have 
a gap of between four and five years, bridged over by 
the narrative speech of the Chorus, and the play closes 
with the espousals of the triumphant English monarch 
and Katharine of Valois, which were solemnized at Troyes 
(in 1420) with unwonted splendor. 

The comic business of the drama, besides representing 



IN TROD UCTIOy. 1 3 

Henry as a lover, where he is seen to least advantage, 
and giving us the badinage of French nobles and English 
soldiers, brings before us again the wild revellers of 
Eastcheap, Pistol and Bardolph, with Nym and Mrs. 
Quickly, the hostess, now married to Pistol. A new 
character, Fluellen, a brave, garrulous, and pedantic 
Welshman, is introduced, and heightens greatly the 
humor of the scene. Falstaff, contrary to the poet's 
promise, has disappeared from the stage ; the king had 
"killed his heart;" but Mrs. Quickly's description of 
the dying scene is a marvellous sketch from nature — a 
photograph over which we may both laugh and cry, and 
which can never be forgotten. Strict moral, if not 
poetical, justice is dealt out to those marauding auxili- 
aries of the camp. Nym and Bardolph are hanged, and 
Pistol, after swaggering through the play as the most 
amusing of braggarts, is beaten by Fluellen, and made 
to "eat his leek "as a "counterfeit, cowardly knave." 
By this time, Mrs. Quickly was gone — she had died in 
the " 'spital " — and Pistol's rendezvous being quite cutoff, 
he returns to England to — steal. 

" And patches will I get unto these scars. 
And swear I got them in the Gallia wars." 

These scenes of low life and humor are, by the plastic 
powers of the poet, made to harmonize wonderfully with 
the martial and national character of the play, besides 
imparting to the shifting scenes an air of truth and 
nature. The grand object of the poet was to commem- 



1 4 I.V TR on UC TIOX. 

orate the battle of Agincourt. Schlegel has truly said, 
' ' The sympathetic affinity by which Shakespeare came 
into most direct contact with his fellow-creatures was 
his patriotism." But his comedy was no less thoroughly 
English, and was as highly appreciated. 



DRAMATIS PERSONS. 



King Henry the Fifth. 

Duke of Gloster, ) , , , _, _,, , . 

(. brothers to the kiif^. 
Duke of Bedford, [ 

Duke of Exeter, uncle to the king. 

Duke of York, cousin to the king. 

Earls of Salisbury, Westmoreland, and Warwick. 

Archbishop of Canterbury. 

Bishop of Ely. 

Earl of Cambridge. 

Lord Scroop, 

Sir Thomas Grey. 

Sir Thomas Erpingham, Gower, Fluellen, Macmor- 

RIS, J amy, officers in King Hetiry's army. 

Bates, Court, Williams, soldiers in the same. 

Pistol, Nym, Bardolph. 

Boy. 

A Herald. 

Charles the Sixth, king of France. 

Lewis, the Dauphin. 

Dukes of Burgundy, Orleans, a;/^ Bourbon. 

The Constable of France. 

Rambures and Grandpre, French lords. 

15 



j6 DRAMATIS FERSOX.^. 

Governor of Harfleur. 
Mont JOY, a French herald. 
Ambassadors to the king of England. 

Isabel, queen of France. 
Katharine, daughter to Chai'les and Isabel. 
Alice, a lady attending on her. 

Hostess of a tavern in Eastcheap. {^formerly Mrs. Quickly, 
and, now married to Pistol I) 

lords. Ladies, Officers, Soldiers, Citizens, Messengers, and 
Attendants. 

Chorus. 
SCENE — In England and in France. 



King Henry V. 



PROLOGUE. 

Enter Chorus. 

Chorus. O, for a Muse of fire, that would 
ascend 
The brightest heaven of invention, 
A kingdom for a stage, princes to act, 
And monarchs to behold the swelling scene ! 
Then should the warlike Harry, like himself, 5 

Assume the port of Mars ; and, at his heels, 
Leash'd in like hounds, should Famine, Sword, 

and Fire 
Crouch for employment. But, pardon, gentles all, 
The fiat, unraised spirits that have dared 
On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth 10 

So great an object. Can this cockpit hold 
The vasty fields of France ? or may we cram 
Within this wooden O the very casques 
That did affright the air at Agincourt ? 
O, pardon ! since a crooked figure may 15 

Attest, in little place, a million ; 
And let us, ciphers to this great accompt. 
On your imaginary forces work. 
Suppose within the girdle of these walls 
Are now confin'd two mighty monarchies, 20 

Whose high upreared and abutting fronts 



iS KING HENRY V. [act i. 

The perilous, narrow ocean parts asunder. 

Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts ; 

Into a thousand parts divide one man, 
25 And make imaginary puissance : 

Think, when we talk ot horses, that you see them 

Printing their proud hoofs i' the receiving earth : 

For 'tis your thoughts that now must deck our 
kings, 

Carry them here and there, jumping o'er times, 
30 Turning the accomplishment of many years 

Into an hour-glass ; for the which supply. 

Admit me Chorus to this history ; 

Who, prologue-like, your humble patience pray 

Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play. [Exit. 



ACT I. 



SCENE I. — Lo?idon. An antechamber in the 
King's Palace. 

Enter Archbishop of Canterbury and Bishop of 
Ely. 

Cant. My lord, I'll tell you — that self bill is 
urg'd 
Which in the eleventh year of the last king's reign 
Was like, and had indeed against us pass'd, 
But that the scambling and unquiet time 
5 Did push it out of farther question. 

Ely. But how, my lord, shall we resist it now .? 
Cant. It must be thought on. If it pass 
against us, 



sc. I.] KING HENR V V. 19 

We lose the better half of our possession ; 
For all the temporal lands which men devout 
By testament have given to the church 10 

Would they strip from us ; being valued thus : — 
As much as would maintain, to the king's honor, 
Full fifteen earls and fifteen hundred knights, 
Six thousand and two hundred good esquires ; 
And, to relief of lazars and weak age, 1 5 

Of indigent faint souls past corporal toil, 
A hundred almshouses right well supplied ; 
And to the coffers of the king beside, 
A thousand pounds by the year : thus runs the 
bill. 

Ely. This would drink deep. 20 

Cant. 'Twould drink the cup and all. 

Ely. But what prevention ? 

Cajit. The king is full of grace and fair regard. 

Ely. And a true lover of the holy church. 

Cant. The courses of his youth promis'd it not. 25 
The breath no sooner left his father's body 
But that his wildness, mortified in him, 
Seem'd to die too : yea, at that very moment, 
Consideration, like an angel, came 
And whipp'd the offending Adam out of him, 2)^ 

Leaving his body as a paradise 
To envelop and contain celestial spirits. 
Never was such a sudden scholar made ; 
Never came reformation in a flood. 
With such a heady currance, scouring faults ; 35 
Nor never Hydra- headed wilfulness 
So soon did lose his seat, and all at once, 
As in this king. 

Ely. We are blessed in the change. 

Cajtt. Hear him but reason in divinitv, 40 



20 KING HENR V V. [act i 

And, all-admiring, with an inward wisli 
You would desire the king were made a prelate : 
Hear him debate of commonwealth affairs. 
You would say it hath been all in all his study : 

45 List his discourse of war, and you shall hear 
A fearful battle render'd you in music : 
Turn him to any cause of policy, 
The Gordian knot of it he will unloose. 
Familiar as his garter : that, when he speaks, 

50 The air, a charter'd libertine, is still. 

And the mute wonder lurketh in men's ears 
To steal his sweet and honey 'd sentences ; 
So that the art and practic part of life 
Must be the mistress to this theoric : 

55 Which is a wonder how his grace should glean it, 
Since his addiction was to courses vain ; 
His companies unletter'd, rude, and shallow ; 
His hours fill'd up with riots, banquets, sports ; 
And never noted in him any study, 

60 Any retirement, any sequestration 
From open haunts and popularity. 

Ely. The strawberry grows underneath the 
nettle ; 
And wholesome berries thrive and ripen best 
Neighbour'd by fruit of baser quality : 

65 And so the prince obscur'd his contemplation 
Under the veil of wildness ; which, no doubt. 
Grew like the summer grass, fastest by night, 
Unseen, yet crescive in his faculty. 

Cant. It must be so ; for miracles are ceas'd ; 

70 And therefore we must needs admit the means 
How things are perfected. 

Ely. But, my good lord, 

How now for mitigation of this bill 



SCI.] KING HENRY V. i\ 

Urg'cl by the commons ? Doth his majest}- 

Indine to it, or no ? -j'^, 

Ca?if. He seems indifferent, 

Or, rather, swaying more upon our part 
Than cherishing the exhibiters against us : 
For I have made an offer to his majesty — 
Upon our spiritual convocation, 80 

And in regard of causes now in hand, 
Which I have open'd to his grace at large. 
As touching France — to give a greater sum 
Than ever at one time the clergy )et 
Did to his predecessors part withal. 85 

Ely. How did this offer seem receiv'd, my lord ? 

Cant. With good acceptance of his majesty ; 
Save that there was not time enough to hear, 
As I perceiv'd his grace would fain have done, 
The severals and unhidden passages 90 

Of his true titles to some certain dukedoms, 
And, generally, to the crown and seat of France 
Deriv'd from Edward, his great-grandfather. 

Ely. What was the impediment that broke 
this off? 

Cant. The French ambassador upon that in- 
stant 95 
Crav'd audience, and the hour, I think, is come 
To give him hearing : is it four o'clock ? 

Ely. It is. 

Cant. Then go we in to know his embassy; 
Which I could, with a ready guess, declare 100 

Before the Frenchman speak a word of it. 

Ely. I'll wait upon you, and I long to hear it. 

[^Exeiint. 



KING HENR V V. [act i. 



SCENE II. — The same. A Room of State in the 
same. 

Enter King Henry, Gloster, Bedford, Exeter, 
Warwick, Westmoreland, and Attendants. 

K. Hen. Where is my gracious Lord of Can- 
terbury ? 
Exe. Not here in presence. 
K. Hen. Send for him, good uncle. 
West. Shall we call in the ambassador, my 
liege ? 
c; K. Hen. Not yet, my cousin ; we would be 
resolv'd, 
Before we hear him, of some things of weight 
That task our thoughts, concerning us and France. 

Enter Archbishop of Canterbury and Bishop of 
Ely. 

Cant. God and his angels guard your sacred 
throne, 
And make you long become it ! 

K. Hen. Sure, we thank you. 

lo My learned lord, we pray you to proceed. 
And justly and rehgiously unfold 
Why the law Salique that they have in France 
Or should, or should not, bar us in our claim. 
And God forbid, my dear and faithful lord, 
15 That you should fashion, wrest, or bow your read- 
ing. 
Or nicely charge your understanding soul 
With opening titles miscreate, whose right 
Suits not in native colors with the truth ; 



sc. II.] KING HENRY V. 23 

For God doth know how many"now in health 

Shall drop their blood in approbation 20 

Of what your reverence shall incite us to : 

Therefore take heed how you impawn our person, 

How you awake our sleeping- sword of war : 

We charge you, in the name of God, take heed : 

For never two such kingdoms did contend 25 

Without much fall of blood ; whose guiltless drops 

Are every one a woe, a sore complaint 

'Gainst him whose wrongs give edge unto the 

swords 
That make such waste in brief mortality. 
Under this conjuration speak, my lord : 30 

For we will hear, note, and believe in heart 
That what you speak is in your conscience wash'd 
As pure as sin with baptism. 

Cant. Then hear me, gracious sovereign, and 

you peers. 
That owe yourselves, your lives, and services -^^ 

To this imperial throne. There is no bar 
To make against your highness' claim to France 
But this, which they produce from Pharamond — 
"/;/ terram Salicavi iniilieres 7ie stcccedant," 
" No woman shall succeed in Salique land : " 40 

Which Salique land the French unjustly gloze 
To be the realm of France, and Pharamond 
The founder of this law and female bar. 
Yet their own authors faithfully affirm 
That the land Salique is in Germany, 45 

Between the floods of Sala and of Elbe : 
Where Charles the Great, having subdued the 

Saxons, 
There left behind and settled certain French ; 
Who, holding in disdain the German women 



24 KING HENRY V. [act I. 

50 For some dishonesi manners of their life, 
Establish'd then this law ; to wit, no female 
Should be inheritrix in Salique land ; 
Which Salique, as 1 said, 'twixt Elbe and Sala, 
Is at this day in Germany call'd Meisen. 

55 Then doth it well appear the Salique law 
Was not devised for the realm of France ; 
Nor did the French possess the Salique land 
Until four hundred one and twenty years 
After defunction of King Pharamond, 

60 Idly suppos'd the founder of this law ; 

Who died within the year of our redemption 
Four hundred twenty-six ; and Charles the Great 
Subdued the Saxons, and did seat the French 
Beyond the river Sala, in the year 

65 Eight hundred five. Besides, their writers say 
King Pepin, which deposed Childerick, 
Did, as heir general, being descended 
Of Blithild, which was daughter to King Clothair, 
Make claim and title to the crown of France. 

70 Hugh Capet also— who usurp'd the crown 

Of Charles the Duke of Lorraine, sole heir-male 
Of the true line and stock of Charles the Great — 
To find his title with some shows of truth, 
(Though, in pure truth, it was corrupt and naught), 

75 Convey 'd himself as heir to the Lady Lingare, 
Daughter to Charlemain, who was the son 
To Lewis the emperor, and Lewis the son 
Of Charles the Great. Also King Lewis the Tenth, 
Who was sole heir to the usurper Capet, 

80 Could not keep quiet in his conscience. 
Wearing the Crown of France, till satisfied 
That fair Queen Isabel, his grandmother, 
Was lineal of the Lady Ermengare, 



sen.] KIXG HENRY V. 25 

Daughter to Charles the foresaid Duke of Lorraine : 
By the which marriage, the hne of Charles the 

Great 85 

Was re-united to the crown of France. 
So that, as clear as is the summer's sun, 
King Pepin's title, and Hugh Capet's claim, 
King Lewis his satisfaction, — all appear 
To hold in right and title of the female. 90 

So do the kings of France unto this day : 
Howbeit they w^ould hold up this Salique law 
To bar your highness claiming from the female, 
And rather choose to hide them in a net 
Than amply to imbar their crooked titles 95 

Usurp'd from you and your progenitors. 
K. Hen. May I with right and conscience 

make this claim ? 
Cant. The sin upon my head, dread sovereign ! 
For in the book of Numbers is it writ, — 
When the man dies, let the inheritance 100 

Descend unto the daughter. Gracious lord. 
Stand for your own ; unwind your bloody flag ; 
Look back into your mighty ancestors : 
Go, my dread lord, to your great-grandsire's tomb, 
From whom you claim ; invoke his warlike spirit, 105 
And your great-uncle's, Edward the Black Prince ; 
Who on the French ground play'd a tragedy, 
Making defeat on the full power of France ; 
Whiles his most mighty father on a hill 
Stood smiling to behold his lion's whel}) no 

Forage in blood of French nobility. 
O noble English, that could entertain 
With half their forces the full pride of France, 
And let another half stand laughing by. 
All out of work and cold for action ! 115 



26 KING HENRY V. [act. i. 

Ely. Awake remembrance of these valdant 
dead, 
And with your puissant arm renew their feats : 
You are their heir, you sit upon their throne ; 
The blood and courage that renowned them 
1 20 Runs in your veins ; and my thrice-puissant liege 
Is in the very May-morn of his youth. 
Ripe for exploits and mighty enterprises. 

Exe. Your brother kings and monarchs of the 
earth 
Do all expect that you should rouse yourself, 
125 As did the former lions of your blood. 

West. They know your grace hath cause and 
means and might : 
So hath your highness ; never king of England 
Had nobles richer and more loyal subjects. 
Whose hearts have left their bodies here in Eng- 
land, 
130 And lie pavilion'd in the fields of France. 

Catit. O, let their bodies follow, my dear liege, 
With blood and sword and fire to win your right : 
In aid whereof, we of the spirituality 
Will raise your highness such a mighty sum 
135 As never did the clergy at one time 
Bring in to any of your ancestors. 

K. Hen. We must not only arm to invade the 
French 
But lay down our proportions to defend 
Against the Scot, who will make road upon us 
140 With all advantages. 

Cant. They of those marches, gracious sover- 
eign, 
Shall be a wall sufficient to defend 
Our inland from the pilfering borderers. 



1 



sc. II.] KING HENR Y V. 27 

K. Hen. We do not mean the coursing snatch- 
ers only, 
But fear the main intendment of the Scot, 145 

Who hath been still a giddy neighbour to us ; 
For you shall read that my great-grandfather 
Never went with his forces into France 
But that the Scot on his unfurnish'd kingdom ;■ 
Came pouring, like the tide into a breach, 150 

With ample and brim fulness of his force. 
Galling the gleaned land with hot essays, 
Girding with grievous siege castles and towns ; 
That England, being empty of defence. 
Hath shook and trembled at the ill neighbourhood. 1 55 

Cant. She hath been then more fear'd than 
harm'd, my liege : 
For hear her but exampled by herself : 
When all her chivalry hath been in France, 
And she a mourning widow of her nobles. 
She hath herself not only well defended i6c> 

But taken and impounded as a stray 
The king of Scots ; whom she did send to France, 
To fill King Edward's fame with prisoner kings, 
And make her chronicle as rich with praise 
As is the ooze and bottom of the sea 165, 

With sunken wreck and sumless treasuries. 

West. But there's a saying, very old and true, — 

" If that you will France win, 
Then with Scotland tirst begin ; " 

For once the eagle England being in prey, 

To her unguarded nest the weasel Scot 

Comes sneaking, and so sucks her princely eggs, ijo 

Playing the mouse, in absence of the cat, 

To tear and havoc more than she can eat. 



28 KING HENRY V. [act i. 

Exe. It follows, then, the cat must stay at 
home : 
Yet that is but a crush'd necessity, 

175 Since we have locks to safeguard necessaries, 
And pretty traps to catch the petty thieves. 
While that the armM hand both tight abroad, 
The advised head defends itself at home : 
" For government, though high and low and lower, 

i3oPut into parts, doth keep in one consent ; 
Congreeing in a full and natural close, 
Like music. 

Cant. Therefore doth Heaven di\'ide 

The state of man in divers functions. 

.135 Setting endeavor in continual motion ; 
To which is fixed, as an aim or butt, 
Obedience : for so work the honey-bees, 
Creatures that by a rule in nature teach 
The act of order to a peopled kingdom. 

190 They have a king and officers of sorts : 

Where some, like magistrates, correct at home, 
Others, like merchants, venture trade abroad. 
Others, like soldiers, arniM in their stings. 
Make boot upon the summer's velvet buds, 

195 Which pillage they with merr}^ march bring home 
To the tent-royal of their emperor : 
Who, busied in his majesty, surveys 
The singing masons building roofs of gold, 
The civil citizens kneading up the honey, 

'200 The poor mechanic porters crovvding in 
Their heavy burdens at his narrow gate, 
The sad-ey'd justice, with his surly hum, 
Delivering o'er to executors pale 
The lazy yawning drone. I this infer, — 

205 That many things, having full reference 



sc. II.] A'lXG HENRY V. 29 

To one consent, may work contrariously : 

As many arrows, loosed several ways. 

Come to one mark ; as many ways meet in one 

town ; 
As many fresh streams meet in one salt sea ; 
As many lines close in the dial's centre ; 210 

So may a thousand actions, once afoot, 
End in one purpose, and be all well borne 
Without defeat. Therefore to France, my liege. 
Divide your happy England into four ; 
Whereof take you one quarter into France, 215 

And you withal shall make all Gallia shake. 
If we, with thrice such powers left at home, 
Cannot defend our own doors from the dog. 
Let us be worried, and our nation lose 
The name of hardiness and policy. 220 

A'. Hen. Call in the messengers sent from the 

Dauphin. [£.ri/ an Attendant. 

Now are we well resolv'd ; and, by God's help. 
And yours, the noble sinews of our power, 
France being ours, we'll bend it to our awe, 
Or break it all to pieces. Or there we'll sit 225 

Ruling in large and ample empery 
O'er France and all her almost kingly dukedoms. 
Or lay these bones in an unworthy urn, 
Tombless, with no remembrance over them : 
Either our history shall with full mouth 230 

Speak freely of our acts, or else our grave. 
Like Turkish mute, shall have a tongueless mouth. 
Not worshipp'd with a waxen epitaph. 

Enter Ambassadors of France. 

Now are we well prepar'd to know the pleasure 

Of our fair cousin Dauphin ; for we hear 235 



<^o KING HENRY V. [act i. 

Your greeting is from him, not from the king. 
Amb. May't please your majesty to give us 
leave 
Freely to render what we have in charge ? 
Or shall we sparingly show you far off 
-J240 The Dauphin's meaning and oun embassy ? 

K. Heji. We are no tyrant^ but a Christian 
king; 
Unto whose grace our passion is as subject 
As are our wretches fetter'd in our prisons : 
^ ■ Therefore with frank and with uncurbed plainness 
245 Tell us the Dauphin's mind, 

Aj?ib. Thus, then, in few. 

Your highness, lately sending into France, 
Did claim some certain dukedoms, in the right 
Of your great predecessor, King Edward the 
Third. 
250 In answer of which claim, the prince our master 
Says that you savor too much of your youth. 
And bids you be advis'd there's naught in France 
That can be with a nimble galliard won : 
You cannot revel into dukedoms there. 
255 He therefore sends you, meeter for your spirit. 
This tun of treasure ; and, in lieu of this. 
Desires you let the dukedoms that you claim 
Hear no- more of you. This the Dauphin speaks. 
K. Hen. What treasure, uncle ? 
260 Exe. Tennis-balls, my liege. 

K. Hen. We are glad the Dauphin is so pleas- 
ant with us ; 
His present and your pains we thank you for : 
When we have match'd our rackets to these balls, 
We will in France, by God's grace, play a set 
265 Shall strike his father's crown into the hazard. 



sc. II.] KING HENRY V. 31 

Tell him he hath made a match with such a 

wrangler 
That all the courts of France will be disturb'd 
With chaces. And we understand him well, 
How he comes o'er us with our wilder days, 
Not measuring what use we made of them. 270 

We never valued this poor seat of England ; 
And therefore, living hence, did give ourself 
To barbarous license ; as 'tis ever common 
That men are merriest when they are from 

home. 
But tell the Dauphin I will keep my state, 275 

Be like a kmg, and show my sail of greatness 
When I do rouse me in my throne of France : 
For that I have laid by my majesty, 
And plodded like a man for working-days ; 
But I will rise there with so full a glory 280 

That I will dazzle all the eyes of France, 
Yea, strike the Dauphin blind to look on us. 
And tell the pleasant prince this mock of his 
Hath turn'd his balls to gun -stones ; and his soul 
Shall stand sore charged for the wasteful ven- 
geance 285 
That shall fly with them : for many a thousand 

widows 
Shall this his mock mock out of their dear hus- 
bands ; 
Mock mothers from their sons, mock castles down: 
And some are yet ungotten and unborn 
That shall have cause to curse the Dauphin's 

scorn. 290 

But this lies all within the wnll of God, 
To whom I do appeal ; and in whose name, 
Tell you the Dauphin I am coming on 



32 KING HENRY V. [act ir. 

To venge me as I may and to put forth 

295 My rightful hand in a well-hallow'd cause. 

So, get you hence in peace ; and tell the Dauphin 
His jest will savor but of shallow wit, 
When thousands weep more than did laugh at it. 
Convey them with safe-conduct. — Fare you well, 
{^Exeunt Ambassadors. 

300 Exe. This was a merry message. 

K. Hen. We hope to make the sender blush 
at it. 
Therefore, my lords, omit no happy hour 
That may give furtherance to our expedition : 
For we have now no thought in us but France, 

305 Save those to God, that run before our business. 
Therefore let our proportions for these wars 
Be soon collected, and all things thought upon 
That may with reasonable swiftness add 
More feathers to our wings ; for, God before, 

310 We'll chide this Dauphin at his father's door. 
Therefore let every man now task his thought 
That this fair action may on foot be brought. 

[Exeunt. 



ACT II. 

Prologue. 

Enter Chorus. 

CJior. Now all the youth of England are on 
fire. 
And silken dalliance in the wardrobe lies ; 
Now thrive the armorers, and honor's thought 



PROLOGUE.] KIXG HENRY V. 33 

Reigns solely in the breast of every man. 

They sell the pasture now to buy the horse ; 5 

Following the mirror of all Christian kings, 

With winged heels, as English Mercuries. 

For now sits Expectation in the air ; 

And hides a sword, from hilts unto the point, 

With crowns imperial, crowns and coronets, lo 

Promis'd to Harr).' and his followers. 

The French, advis'd by good intelligence 

Of this most dreadful preparation, 

Shake in their fear, and with pale policy 

Seek to divert the English purposes. 15 

O England ! model to thy inward greatness, 

Like little body with a mighty heart, 

What mightst thou do that honor would thee do, 

Were all thy children kind and natural ! 

But see thy fault ! France hath in thee found out 10 

A nest of hollow bosoms, which he fills 

With treacherous crowns ; and three corrupted 

men — 
One, Richard Earl of Cambridge ; and the second, 
Henry Lord Scroop of Masham ; and the third, 
Sir Thomas Grey, knight, of Northumberland — 25 
Have, for the gilt of France (O guilt indeed !) 
Confirm'd conspiracy with fearful France ; 
And by their hands this grace of kings must die. 
If hell and treason hold their promises, 
Ere he take ship for France, and in Southampton. 30 
Linger your patience on, and we'll digest 
The abuse of distance [while we] force a play. 
The sum is paid ; the traitors are agreed ; 
The king is set from London ; and the scene 
Is now transported, gentles, to Southampton : 35 
There is the playhouse now, there must you sit : 



34 KING HENRY V. [act ii. 

And thence to France shall we convey you safe, 
And bring you back, charming the narrow seas 
To give you gentle pass ; for, if we may, 
40 We'll not offend one stomach with our play. 
But, till the king come forth, and not till thdn, 
Unto Southampton do we shift our scene. {Exit. 

SCENE I. — Lo7tdon. Before the Boars-Head 
Tavern, East cheap. 

Enter, severally, Nym end Eardolph. 

Bard. Well met. Corporal Nym. 

Nym. Good- morrow, Lieutenant Bardolph. 

Bard. What, are Ancient Pistol and you friends 

yet ? 

Nym. For my part, I care not : I say little ; but, 

5 when time shall serve, there shall be smiles ; but 

that shall be as it may. I dare not fight ; but I 

will wink, and hold out mine iron. It is a simple 

one ; but what though ? it will toast cheese, and 

it will endure cold as another man's sword will : 

10 and there's an end. 

Bard. I will bestow a breakfast to make you 
friends ; and we'll be all three sworn brothers to 
France ; let it. be so, good Corporal Nym. 

Nym. Faith, I will liv^e so long as I may, that's 
15 the certain of it ; and, when I cannot hve any 
longer, I will do as I may : that is my rest, that 
is the rendezvous of it. 

Bard. It is certain, corporal, that he is married 
to Nell Quickly : and certainly she did you 
2:0 wrong ; for you were troth- plight to her. 

Nym. I cannot tell ; things must be as they 



sc. I.] KING HENR Y V. 35 

may : men may sleep, and they may have their 
throats about them at that time ; and some say 
knives have edges. It must be as it may : though 
patience be a tired mare, yet she will plod. There 25 
must be conclusions. Well, I cannot tell. 

Bard. Here comes Ancient Pistol and his wife : 
■ — good corporal, be patient here. 

Enter Pistol and Hostess. 

How now, mine host Pistol ! 

Pist. Base tike, call'st thou me host ? 30 

Now, by this hand, I swear I scorn the term ; 
Nor shall my Nell keep lodgers. 

Host. No, by my troth, not long. [Nym draws 
his sword]. O well-a-day, Lady, if he be not 
drawn now ! We shall see murder committed. 35 

Bard. Good lieutenant 1 good corporal ! offer 
nothing here. 

Nym. Pish. 

Pist. Pish for thee, Iceland dog ! thou prick- 
ear'd cur of Iceland. 

Host. Good Corporal Nym, show thy valor, 40 
and put up your sword. 

Nym. Will you shog off? I would have you 
solus. [Sheathing his sword. 

Pist. Sohts, egregious dog ! O viper vile ! 
The solus in thy most mervailous face ; 45 

The solus in thy teeth and in thy throat 
And in thy hateful lungs, yea, in thy maw, perdy ; 
And, which is worse, within thy nasty mouth ! 
I do retort the solus in thy bowels ; 
For I can take, and Pistol's cock is up, 50 

And flashing fire will follow. 



36 KING HENRY V. [act ii. 

Ny?n. I am not Barbason ; you cannot conjure 
me. I have a humor to knock you indifferently 
well. If you grow foul with me, Pistol, I will 
5^ scour you with my rapier, as I may, in fair terms : 
if you would walk off, I would prick you a little, 
in good terms, as I may; and that's the humor of it. 
Fist. O braggard vile, and reckless furious 
wight ! 
The grave doth gape, and doting death is near, 
60 Therefore exhale. [Pistol and Nym draw. 

Bard. Hear me, hear me what I say : — he that 
strikes the first stroke, I'll run him up to the hilts, 
as I am a soldier. \ Draws. 

Pist. An oath of mickle might ; and fury shall 
abate. 
65 Give me thy fist, thy fore-foot to me give ; 
Thy spirits are most tall. 

Nym. 1 will cut thy throat, one time or other, 
in fair terms ; that is the humor of it. 

Pist. Coupe le gorge ! that's the word : — I defy 
thee again. 
70 O hound of Crete, think'st thou my spouse to get? 
I have, and I will hold, the quondam Quickly 
For the only she ; and — pauca, there's enough. 
Go to. 

Enter the Boy. 

Boy. Mine host Pistol, you must come to my 
75 master — and you, hostess ; he is very sick, and 
would to bed. — Good Bardolph, put thy face be- 
tween his sheets, and do the office of a warming- 
pan. Faith, he's very ill. 
Bard. Away, you rogue ! 
80 Host. By my troth, he'll yield the crow a pud- 



sc. I.] KING HENR Y V. 37 

ding one of these days : the king has killed his 
heart. — Good husband, come home presently. 

\^Exeujit Hostess and Boy. 

Bard. Come, shall I make you two friends ? 
We must to France together. Why should we 
keep knives to cut one another's throats ? 85 

Pist. Let floods o'erswell, and flends for food 
howl on ! 

Nym. You'll pay me the eight shillings I won 
of you at betting ? 

Pist. Base is the slave that pays. 90 

Nym. That now I will have ; tfiat's the humor 
of it. 

Pist. As manhood shall compound : push 
home. [Pistol and Nym draw. 

Bard. By this sword, he that makes the first 95 
thrust I'll kill him ; by this sword, I wall. 

Pist. Sword is an oath, and oaths must have 
their course. 

Bard. Corporal Nym, an thou wilt be friends, 
be friends ; an thou wilt not, why then be enemies 100 
with me too. Prithee, put up. 

Nym. I shall have my eight shillings I won of 
you at betting. 

Pist. A noble shalt thou have, and present pay; 
And liquor likewise will I give to thee, 105 

And friendship shall combine, and brotherhood : 
I'll live by Nym, and Nym shall live by me ; — 
Is not this just ? — for I shall sutler be 
Unto the camp, and profits will accrue. 
Give me thy hand, 1 10 

Nym. I shall have my noble ? 

Pist. In cash most justly paid. 

Nym. Well, then, that's the humor of it. 



38 KING HENR V V. [act ii. 



Re-enter Hostess. 

Host. As ever you came of women, come in 

115 quickly to Sir Joiin. Ah, poor heart! he is so 

shaked of a burning quotidian tertian that it is 

most lamentable to behold. Sweet men, come to 

him. 

Nym. The king hath run bad humors on the 
120 knight, that's the even of it., 

Pist. Nym, thou hast spoke the right ; 
His heart is fracted and corroborate. 

Nym. The king is a good king : but it must 

be as it may ; he passes some humors and careers. 

125 Pist. Let us condole the knight ; for lambkins 

we will live. [Exeutif. 

SCENE II. — Southampton. A Council-Chamber. 

Enter EXETER, BEDFORD, and WESTMORELAND. 

Bed. His grace is bold to trust these traitors. 
Exe. They shall be apprehended by and by. 
West. How smooth and even they do bear 
themselves ! 
As if allegiance in their bosoms sat, 
5 Crowned with faith and constant loyalty. 

Bed. The king hath note of all that they intend, 
By interception which they dream not of. 

Exe. Nay, but the man that was his bedfellow, 
Whom he hath duU'd and cloy'd with gracious 
favors, — 
10 That he should, for a foreign purse, so sell 
His sovereign's life to death and treachery ! 



sc. II.] KING HENK V V. 39 

Trumpets sound. Enter King Henry, Scroop, 
Cambridge, Grey, Lords, and Attendants. 

K. Hen. Now sits the wind fair, and we will 

aboard. 
My Lord of Cambridge, and my kind Lord of 

Masham, 
And you, my gentle knight, give me your thoughts : 
Think you not that the powers we bear with us 1 5 
Will cut their passage through the force of France, 
Doing the execution and the act 
For which we have in head assembled them ? 
Scroop. No doubt, my liege, if each man do his 

best. 
K. Hen. I doubt not that ; since we are well 

persuaded 20 

We carry not a heart with us from hence 
That grows not in a fair consent with ours. 
Nor leave not one behind that doth iTot wish 
Success and conquest to attend on us. 

Cam. Never was monarch better fear'd and 

lov'd 2 5 

Than is your majesty ; there's not, I think, a 

subject 
That sits in heart-grief and uneasiness 
Under the sweet shade of your government. 
Grey. True : those that were your father's 

enemies 
Have steep'd their galls in honey, and do serve 

you 30 

With hearts create of duty and of zeal. 

K. Hen. We therefore have great cause of 

thankfulness, 
And shall forget the office of our hand 



40 KING HENRY V. [act ii. 

Sooner than quittance ot desert and merit 
35 According to the weight and worthiness. 

Scroop. So service shall with steeled sinews 
toil, 
And labor shall refresh itself with hope 
To do your grace incessant services. 

K. Hen. We judge no less. — Uncle of Exeter, 
40 Enlarge the man committed yesterday 

That rail'd against our person : we consider 
It was exxess of wine that set him on ; 
And on his more advice we pardon him. 

Scroop. That's mercy, but too much securiiy : 
45 Let him be punished, sovereign, lest example 
Breed, by his sufferance, more of such a kind. 
K. Hen. O, let us yet be merciful. 
Cavi. So may your highness, and yet punish too. 
Grey. Sir, you show^ great mercy, if you give 
him life, 
50 After the taste of much correction. 

K. Hen. Alas, your too much love and care of 
me 
Are heavy orisons 'gainst this poor wretch ! 
If little faults, proceeding on distemper. 
Shall not be wink'd at, how shall we stretch our 

eye 
When capital crimes, chew'd, swallow'd, and 
55 digested, 

Appear before us ? — We'll yet enlarge that man, 
Though Cambridge, Scroop, and Grey, in their 

dear care 
And tender preservation of our person, 
Would have him punish'd. And now to our 
French causes ; 
60 Who are the late commissioners ? 



sc. II.] KING HENR Y V. 41 

Ca?n. I one, my lord, 
Your highness bade me ask for it to-day. 
Scroop. So did you me, my hege. 
Grey. And me, my royal sovereign. 
K. Hen. Then, Richard Earl of Cambridge, 
there is yours ; 65 

There yours, Lord Scroop of Masham ; and, sir 

knight, 
Grey of Northumberland, this same is yours : 
Read them ; and know I know your worthiness. 
My Lord of Westmoreland, and Uncle Exeter, 
We will aboard to-night. — Why, how now, gen- 
tlemen ! 70 
What see you in those papers that you lose 
So much complexion ? — look ye how they change I 
Their cheeks are paper. — Why, what read you 

there 
That hath so cowarded and chas'd your blood 
Out of appearance ? 75 

Cam. I do confess my fault ; 

And do submit me to your highness' mercy. 
Grey, Scroop. To which we all appeal. 
K. Hen. The mercy that was quick in us but 
late 
By your own counsel is suppress'd and kill'd : 80 
You must not dare, for shame, to talk of mercy ; 
For your own reasons turn into your bosoms, 
As dogs upon their masters, worrying you. 
See you, my princes, and my noble peers. 
These English monsters ! My Lord of Cambridge 

here, — 85 

You know how apt our love was to accord 
To furnish him with all appertinents 
Belonging to his honor ; and this man 



42 KING HENRY V. [act ii. 

Hath, for a few light crowns, lightly conspir'd, 
90 And sworn unto the practices of France 
To kill us here in Hampton ; to the which. 
This knight, no less for bounty bound to us 
Than Cambridge is, hath likewise sworn. But O, 
What shall I say to thee. Lord Scroop ? thou cruel, 
95 Ingrateful, savage, and inhuman creature ! 
Thou that didst bear the key of all my counsels, 
That knew'st the very bottom of my soul. 
That almost mightst have coined me into gold, 
Wouldst thou have practis'd on me for thy use ; — 

100 May it be possible that foreign hire 

Could out of thee extract one spark of evil 
That might annoy my finger ? 'tis so strange 
That, though the truth of it stands off as gross 
As black from w^hite, my eye will scarcely see it. 

105 Treason and murder ever kept together. 

As two yoke-devils sworn to cither's purpose, 
Working so grossly in a natural cause 
That admiration did not whoop at them : 
But thou, 'gainst all proportion, didst bring in 

up Wonder to wait on treason and on murder : 
And whatsoever cunning fiend it was 
That wrought upon thee so preposterously 
Gave thee no instance why thou shouldst do trea- 
son 
Unless to dub thee with the name of traitor. 

115 If that same demon that hath gull'd thee thus 
Should with his lion gait walk the whole world, 
He might return to vasty Tartar back. 
And tell the legions, " I can never win 
A soul so easy as that Englishman's." 

120 O, how hast thou with jealousy infected 

The sweetness of affiance ! Show men dutiful ? 



sc. II.] KING HENRY V, 43 

Why, so didst thou : seem they grave and learned ? 

Why, so didst thou : come they of noble family ? 

Why, so didst thou : seem they religious ? 

Why, so didst thou : or are they spare in diet, 125 

Free from gross passion or of mirth or anger, 

Constant in spirit, not swerving with the blood, 

Garnish'd and deck'd in modest complement ; 

Not working with the eye without the ear. 

And but in purged judgment trusting neither ? 130 

Such and so finely bolted didst thou seem : 

And thus thy fall hath left a kind of blot 

To mark the full-fraught man and best indued 

With some suspicion. I will weep for thee ; 

For this revolt of thine, methinks, is like 135 

Another fall of man.— Their faults are open. 

Arrest them to the answer of the law ; 

And God acquit them of their practices I 

Exe. I arrest thee of high treason, by the name 
of Richard Earl of Cambridge. 14.0 

I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of 
Henry Lord Scroop of Masham. 

I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of 
Thomas Grey, knight, of Northumberland. 

Scroop. Our purposes God justly hath discover'd; 145 
And I repent my fault more than my death ; 
Which I beseech your highness to forgive. 
Although my body pay the price of it. 

Cam. For me — the gold of France did not 
seduce ; 
Although I did admit it as a motive 150 

The sooner to effect what I intended : 
But God be thanked for prevention ; 
Which I in sufferance heartily will rejoice, 
Beseeching God and you to pardon me. 



44 KING HENRY V. [act ii. 

155 Grey. Never did faithful subject more rejoice 
At the discovery of most dangerous treason 
Than I do at this hour joy o'er myself, 
Prevented from a damned enterprise : 
My fault, but not my body, pardon, sovereign. 
K. Heii. God quit you in his mercy! Hear 

160 your sentence. 

You have conspir'd against our royal person, 
Join'd with an enemy proclaim'd, and from his 

coffers 
Receiv'd the golden earnest of our death ; 
Wherein you would have sold your king to 
slaughter, 

165 His princes and his peers to servitude, 
His subjects to oppression and contempt, 
And his whole kingdom into desolation. 
Touching our person, seek we no revenge ; 
But we our kingdom's safety must so tender, 

170 Whose ruin you have sought, that to her laws 
We do deliver you. Get you therefore hence, 
Poor miserable wretches, to your death : 
The taste whereof, God, of his mercy, give you 
Patience to endure, and true repentance 

175 Of all your dear offences ! — Bear them hence. 

\Exeitnt Conspirators, guarded. 
Now, lords, for France ; the enterprise whereof 
Shall be to you, as us, like glorious. 
We doubt not of a fair and lucky war ; 
Since God so graciously hath brought to light 

180 This dangerous treason lurking in our way 
To hinder our beginnings. We doubt not now 
But every rub is smoothed on our way. 
Then, forth, dear countrymen ; let us deliver 
Our puissance into the hands of God, 



sc. III.] KIXG HEXRY V. 45 

Putting it straight in expedition. 

Cheerly to sea ; the signs of war adv'ance : 

No king of England, if not king of France. 

^Exeunt. 

SCENE III. — Lo7idon. The Boaj-' s-Hcad Tava-n, 
Eastcheap. 

Eiitci- Pistol, Hostess, Nym, Bardolph, and 
Boy. 

Host. Prithee, honey-sweet husband, let me 
bring thee to Staines, 

Pist. No ; for my manly heart doth yearn. 
Bardolph, be blithe ; — Nym, rouse thy \'aunting 

veins ; 
Boy, bristle thy courage up ; for Falstaff he is dead, 5 
And we must yearn therefore. 

Bard. Would I were with him, wheresome'er 
he is ! 

Host. Nay, sure, he's in Arthur's bosom, if 
ever man went to Arthur's bosom. 'A made a finer 10 
end and went away an it had been any chris- 
tom child ; a parted even just between twelve 
and one, even at the turning o' the tide : for after 
I saw him fumble with the sheets and play with 
the flowers and smile upon his fingers' ends, 1 15 
knew there was but one way ; for his nose was as 
sharp as a pen, and 'a babbled of green fields. 
" How now, Sir John." quoth I : " what, man ! be 
of good cheer." So 'a cried out, " God, God, 
God!" three or four times. Now I, to comfort 20 
him, bid him 'a should not think of God ; I hoped 
there was no need to trouble himself with any 



46 KING HENRY V. [act ii. 

such thoughts yet. So 'a bade me lay more 
clothes on his feet : I put my hand into the bed and 
25 felt them, and they were as cold as any stone ; then 
I felt to his knees, and all was as cold as any 
stone. 

Nym. They say he cried out of sack. 
Host. Ay, that 'a did. 
30 Bard. And of women. 

Host. Nay, that a did not. 

Boy. Yes, that 'a did ; and said they were 

devils incarnate. 
Host. 'A could never abide carnation : 'twas a 

color he never liked. 
Boy. 'A said once the devil would have him 
about women. 
35 Host. 'A did in some sort, indeed ; but then he 
was rheumatic. 

Boy. Do you not remember, 'a saw a flea stick 

upon Bardolph's nose, and 'a said it was a black 

soul burning ? 

40 Bard. Well, the fuel is gone that maintained 

that fire : that's all the riches I got in his service. 

Nym. Shall we shog ? the king will be gone 

from Southampton. 
Pist. Come, let's away. — My love, give m.e thy 
lips. 
Look to my chattels and my movables .: 
45 Let senses rule ; the word is, " Pitch and pay ; " 
Trust none : 

For oaths are straws, men's faiths are wafer-cakes, 
And hold-fast is the only dog, my duck ; 
Therefore, caveto be thy counsellor. 
50 Go, clear thy crystals. — Yoke-fellows in arms. 
Let us to France ; like horse-leeches, my boys ; 



sc. IV.] KING HENR V V. 47 

To suck, to suck, the very blood to suck ! 

Boy. And that is but unwholesome food, they 

say. 
Pist. Touch her soft mouth, and march. 
Bard. Farewell, hostess. [Kissing her. 55 

Nyni. I cannot kiss, that is the humor of it ; 

but, adieu. 
Pist. Let housewifery appear ; keep close, I 

thee command. 
Host. Farewell ; adieu. {^Exeunt. 

SCENE IV. — France. A Room in the French 
King's Palace. 

Enter the French King attended ; the Dauphin, the 
Duke of Burgundy, the Constable, and others. 

Fr. King. Thus comes the English with full 
power upon us, 
And more than carefully it us concerns 
To answer royally in our defences. 
Therefore the Dukes of Berri and Bretagne, 
Of Brabant and of Orleans, shall make forth, 5 

And you, Prince Dauphin, with all swift despatch, 
To line and new repair our towns of war 
With men of courage and with means defendant ; 
For England his approaches make as fierce 
As waters to the sucking of a gulf. 10 

It fits us then to be as provident 
As fear may teach us out of late examples 
Left by the fatal and neglected English 
Upon our fields. 

Dau. My most redoubted father, 15 

It is most meet we arm us 'gainst the foe : 



48 KING HENRY V. [act ii. 

For peace itself should not so dull a kingdom, 
Though war nor no known quarrel were in ques- 
tion, 
But that defences, musters, preparations 

20 Should be maintain'd, assembled, and collected, 
As were a war in expectation. 
Therefore I say 'tis meet we* all go forth 
To view the sick and feeble parts of France ; 
And let us do it wdth no show of fear ; 

25 No, with no more than if we heard that England 
Were busied with a Whitsun morris- dance : 
For, my good liege, she is so idly king'd. 
Her sceptre so fantastically borne 
By a vain, giddy, shallow, humorous youth 

30 That fear attends her not. 

Con. O peace. Prince Dauphin ! 

You are too much mistaken in this king : 
Question your grace the late ambassadors. 
With what great state he heard their embassy, 

35 How well supplied with noble counsellors, 
How modest in exception, and withal 
How terrible in constant resolution, 
And you shall find his vanities forespent 
W^ere but the outside of the Roman Brutus, 

40 Covering discretion with a coat of folly ; 

As gardeners do with ordure hide those roots 
That shall first spring and be most delicate. 

Dau. Well, 'tis not so, my lord high constable ; 
But, though we think it so, it is no matter : 

45 In cases of defence 'tis best to weigh 
The enemy more mighty than he seems : 
So the proportions of defence are fill'd ; 
Which, of a weak and niggardly projection, 
Doth like a miser spoil his coat with scanting 



sc. IV.] KING HENRY V. 49 

k 

A little cloth. 50 

/r. /Ctn^. ThiriK we King Harry strong ; 
And, princes, look you strongly arm to meet him. 
The kindred of him hath been flesh'd upon us ; 
And he is bled out of that bloody strain 
That haunted us in our famihar paths : 55 

Witness our too much memorable shame, 
When Cressy battle fatally was struck 
And all our princes captiv'd by the hand 
Of that black name, Edward, Black Prince of 

Wales ; 
Whiles that his mountain sire, on mountain 

standing, 60 

Up in the air, crovvn'd with the golden sun, 
Saw his heroical seed, and smil'd to see him 
Mangle the work of nature, and deface 
The patterns that by God and by French fathers 
Had twenty years been made. This is a stem 65 
Of that victorious stock ; and let us fear 
The native mightiness and fate of him. 

Enter a Messenger. 

Mess. Ambassadors from Harry King of Eng- 
land 
Do crave admittance to your majesty. 

Fr. King, We'll give them present audience. 70 
Go and bring them. 

[Exeunt Messenger and certain Lords. 
You see this chase is hotly follow'd, friends . 
Daii. Turn head, and stop pursuit : for cow- 
ard dogs 
Most spend their mouths when what they seem to 

threaten 
Runs far before them. Good my sovereign, 75 



50 KING HENRY V. [act II. 

Take up the English short, and let them know 
Of what a monarchy you are the head ; 
Self-love, my liege, is not so vile a sin 
As self-neglecting. 

Re-enter Lords, with Exeter and Train. 

80 Fr. King. From our brother England ? 

Exe. From him ; and thus he greets your maj- 
esty. 
He wills you, in the name of God Almighty, 
That you divest yourself, and lay apart 
The borrowed glories that, by gift of Heaven, 
85 By law of nature and of nations, 'long 

To him and to his heirs ; namely, the crown. 
And all wide-stretched honors that pertain, 
By custom and the ordinance of times, 
Unto the crown of France. That you may know 
90 'Tis no sinister nor no awkward claim, 

Pick'd from the worm-holes of long-vanish'd days, 
Nor from the dust of old oblivion rak'd, 
He sends you this most memorable line, 

[ Gives a paper. 
In every branch truly demonstrative ; 
95 Willing you overlook this pedigree : 
And when you find him evenly deriv'd 
From his most fam'd of famous ancestors, 
Edward the Third, he bids you then resign 
Your crown and kingdom, indirectly held 
100 From him the native and true challenger. 
Fr. King. Or else what follows ? 
Exe. Bloody constraint ; for, if you hide the 
crown 
Even in your hearts, there will he rake for it : 



sc. IV.] KING HENRY V. 51 

Therefore in fierce tempest is he coming. 

In thunder and in earthquake, like a Jove, 105 

That, if requiring fail, he will compel ; 

And bids you, in the bowels of the Lord, 

Deliver up the crown, and to take mercy 

On the poor souls for whom his hungry war 

Opens his vasty jaws ; and on your head 1 10 

Turning the widows' tears, the orphans' cries, 

The dead men's blood, the pining maidens' groans, 

For husbands, fathers, and betrothed lovers. 

That shall be swallow'd in this controversy. 

This is his claim, his threat'ning, and my message : 115 

Unless the Dauphin be in presence here, 

To whom expressly I bring greeting too. 

Fr. King. For us, we will consider of this 
further : 
To-morrow shall you bear our full intent 
Back to our brother England. 120 

Dau. For the Dauphin, 

I stand here for him : what to him from England ? 

Exe. Scorn and defiance ; slight regard, con- 
tempt. 
And anything that may not misbecome 
The mighty sender, doth he prize you at. 125 

Thus says my king : an if your father's highness 
Do not, in grant of all demands at large. 
Sweeten the bitter mock you sent his majesty. 
He'll call you to so hot an answer of it 
That caves and womby vaultages of France 130 

Shall chide your trespass, and return your mock 
In second accent of his ordnance. 

Dau. Say if my father render fair return, 
It is against my will ; for I desire 
Nothing but odds with England : to that end, 135 



52 KING HENRY V. [act iii. 

As matching to his youth and vanity, 
I did present him with the Paris balls. 

Exe. He'll make your Paris Louvre shake for 
it, 
Were it the mistress court of mighty Europe : 
140 And, be assur'd, you'll hnd a difference. 
As we, his subjects, have in wonder found, 
Between the promise of his greener days 
And these he masters now ; now he weighs time 
Even to the utmost grain ; that you shall read 
145 In your own losses, if he stay in France, 

Fr. King. To-morrow shall you know our 

mind at full. 
Exe, Despatch us with all speed, lest that our 
king 
Come here himself to question our delay ; 
For he is footed in this land already. 
150 Fr. Kijig. You shall be soon despatch'd with 
fair conditions : 
A night is but small breath and little pause 
To answer matters of this consequence. 

\Exeuiit. 



ACT III. 
Prologue. 
Enter Chorus. 

Chor. Thus with imagin'd wing our swift 
scene flies 
In motion of no less celerity 

Than that of thought. Suppose that you have seen 
The well-appointed king at Hampton pier 



prologue] king henry V. 53 

Embark his royalty ; and his brave fleet 5 

With silken streamers the young Phoebus fanning. 
Play with your fancies, and in them behold 
Upon the hempen tackle ship-boys climbing ; 
Hear the shrill whistle which doth order give 
To sounds confus'd ; behold the threaden sails, 10 
Borne with the invisible and creeping wind. 
Draw the huge bottoms through the furrow'd sea, 
Breasting the lofty surge : O, do but think 
You stand upon the rivage, and behold 
A city on the inconstant billows dancing ; 15 

For so appears this fleet majestical, 
Holding due course to Harfleur, Follow, follow ! 
Grapple your minds to sternage of this navy. 
And leave your England, as dead midnight still, 
Guarded with grandsires, babies, and old women, 20 
Either past or not arriv'd to pith and puissance : 
For who is he, whose chin is but enrich'd 
With one appearing hair, that will not follow 
These cuU'd and choice-drawn cavaliers to France ? 
Work, work your thoughts, and therein see a siege ; 25 
Behold the ordnance on their carriages, 
With fatal mouths gaping on girded Harfleur. 
Suppose the ambassador from the French comes 

back ; 
Tells Harry that the king doth offer him 
Katharine his daughter ; and with her, to dowry, 30 
Some petty and unprofitable dukedoms. 
The offer likes not : and the nimble gunner 
With linstock now the devilish cannon touches, 

[Alar tern ; and chainbers go off within. 
And down goes all befc^-e them. Still be kind. 
And eke out our performance with your mind. 35 

{Exit, 



54 KING HENRY V. [act iii. 



SCENE I. — France. Before Harfieicr. 

Alarums. Enter King Henry, Exeter, Bedford, 
Gloster, and Soldiers, with scaling ladders. 

K. Hen. Once more unto the breach, dear 
• friends, once more ; 
Or close the wall up with our English dead ! 
In peace there's nothing so becomes a man 
As modest stillness and humility : 
5 But, when the blast of war blows in our ears, 
Then imitate the action of the tiger ; 
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood. 
Disguise fair nature with hard-favored rage ; 
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect ; 

lo Let it pry through the portage of the head 

Like the brass cannon ; let the brow o'erwhelm it. 
As fearfully as doth a galled rock 
O'erhang and jutty his confounded base, 
Swill'd with the wild and wasteful ocean, 

15 Now set the teeth, and stretch the nostril wide, 
Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit 
To his full height ! On, on, you noblest English, 
Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof ! — 
Fathers that, like so many Alexanders, 

20 Have in these parts from morn till even fought, 
And sheath'd their swords for lack of argument : 
Dishonor not your mothers ; now attest 
That those whom you call'd fathers did beget 

you ! 
Be copy now to men of grosser blood, 

25 And teach them how to war ! — And you, good 
yeomen, 
Whose limbs were made in England, show us here 



sc. II.] KING HENRY V, 55 

The mettle of your pasture ; let us swear 

That you are worth your breeding : which I doubt 

not ; 
For there is none of you so mean and base 
That hath not noble lustre in your eyes. 2P 

I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips. 
Straining upon the start. The game's afoot ; 
Follow your spirit ; and upon this charge 
Cry, " God for Harry! England! and Saint George!" 
[Exeunt. Alarum, attd chaiJibers go off within. 



SCENE W.— The same. 

Forces pass over; then enter Nym, Bardolph, 
Pistol, and Boy. 

Bard. On, on, on, on, on ! to the breach, to 
the breach ! 

Ny7n, Pray thee, corporal, stay ; the knocks 
are too hot ; and, for mine own part, I have not a 
case of lives : the humor of it is too hot, that is 5 
the very plain-song of it. 

Pist. The plain-song is most just ; for humors 
do abound : 
Knocks go and come ; God's vassals drop and die ; 
And sword and shield, 
In bloody field, 10 

Doth win immortal fame. 

Boy. Would I were in an alehouse in London ! 
I would give all my fame for a pot of ale and 
safety. 

Pist. And I. ^ rs 



56 KING HENRY V. [act ill. 

If wishes would prevail with me, 
My purpose should not fail with me, 
But thither would I hie. 

Boy. As duly, but not as truly, 
20 As bird doth sing on bough. 

Enter Fluellen. 

Flu. Up to the preach, you dogs ! avaunt, 
you cullions. \privi71g them forward. 

Pist. Be merciful, great duke, to men of mould! 
Abate thy rage, abate thy manly rage ! 
25 Abate thy rage, great duke ! 

Good bawcock, bate thy rage ! use lenity, sweet 
chuck ! 
Nyin. These be good humors I — your honor 
wins bad humors. 

[Exeunt Nym, Pistol, and Bardolph, fol- 
lowed by Flui;llen. 
Boy. As young as I am, I have observed these 
30 three swashers. I am boy to them all three : 
but all they three, though they would serve me, 
could not be man to me ; for, indeed, three such 
antics do not amount to a man. For Bardolph — 
he is white-livered and red-faced ; by the means 
35 whereof 'a faces it out, but fights not. For Pistol 
— he hath a killing tongue and a quiet sword ; by 
the means whereof *a breaks words, and keeps whole 
weapons. For Nym — he hath heard that men of 
few words are the best men ; and therefore he 
40 scorns to say his prayers, lest 'a should be thought 
a coward : but his few bad words are match'd 
with as few good deeds ; for 'a never broke any 
man's head but his own, and that was against a 



sc. II.] KING HENR Y V. 57 

post when he was drunk. They will steal any- 
thing, and call it purchase. Bardolph stole a 45 
lute-case, bore it twelve leagues, and sold it for 
three-halfpence. Nym and Bardolph are sworn 
brothers in filching, and in Calais they stole a 
tire-shovel : I knew by that piece of service the 
men would carry coals. They would have me as 5a 
familiar with men's pockets as their gloves or 
their handkerchers : which makes much against 
my manhood, if I should take from another's pocket 
to put into mine ; for it is plain pocketing up of 
wrongs. I must leave them and seek some better 55 
service : their villainy goes against my weak stom- 
ach, and therefore I must cast it up. \Exit. 

Re-etiter Fluellen, Go^yt^ following. 

Gow, Captain Fluellen, you must come pres- 
ently to the mines ; the Duke of Gloster would 
speak to you. 60- 

Flu. To the mines ! tell you the duke it is not so 
good to come to the mines; for, look you, the mines 
is not according to the disciplines of the war; the 
concavities of it is not sufficient ; for, look you, th' 
athversary, you may discuss unto the duke, look 65 
you, is digt himself four yard under the counter- 
mines : I think 'a will plow up all, if there is not 
better directions. 

Goiv.^ The Duke of Gloster, to whom the order 
of the siege is given, is altogether directed by an 70 
Irishman, a very valiant gentleman, i' faith. 

Flu. It is Captain Macmorris, is it not ? 

Gow. I think it be. 

Flu. He is an ass as in the 'orld : I will verify 
as much in his peafd ; he has no more directions ']$ 



58 KING HENRY V, [act iii. 

in the true disciplines of the wars, look you, of the 
Roman disciplines, that is a puppy-dog. 

Gow. Here 'a comes ; and the Scots captain, 
Captain Jamy, with him. 

80 Flu. Captain Jamy is a marvellous falorous 
gentleman, that is certain ; and of great expedition 
and knowledge in the auncient wars, upon my par- 
ticular knowledge of his directions. He will main- 
tain his argument as well as any military man in 

85 the 'orld, in the disciplines of the pristine wars of 
the Romans. 

Enter Macmorrts and] amy. 

Jamy. I say gud-day. Captain Fluellen. 

Flu. God-den to your worship, goot Captain 
Jamy. 
90 Gow. How now. Captain Macmorris ? have 
you quit the mines ? have the pioneers given o'er ? 

Mac. La, tish ill done : the work ish give over, 
the trumpet sound the retreat. By my hand I 
swear, and my father's soul, the work ish ill done ; 
95 it ish give over ; I would have blowed up the 
town, la, in an hour. O, tish ill done, tish ill done ; 
by my hand, tish ill done ! 

Flu. Captain Macmorris, I peseech you now, 
will you voutsafe me, look you, a few disputations 
100 with you, as partly touching or concerning the 
disciplines of the war, the Roman wars, in the 
way of argument, look you, and friendly communi- 
cation ; partly to satisfy my opinion, and partly 
for the satisfaction, look you, of my mind, as touch- 
105 ing the direction of the military discipline ? that 
is the point. 

Jamy, It sail be vary gud, gud feith, gud cap- 



sc. il] king HENR V V. 59 _ 

tains bath ; and I sail quit you with gud leve, as I 
may pick occasion ; that sail I, mary. 

Afac. It is no time to discourse. The day is no 
hot, and the weather and the wars and the king 
and the dukes : it is no time to discourse. The 
town is beseeched, and the trumpet call us to the 
breach ; and we talk, and do nothing : 'tis shame 
for us all: 'tis shame to stand still ; it is shame, 115 
by my hand : and there is throats to be cut, and 
works to be done ; and there ish nothing done, la. 

Ja7ny. By the mess, ere theise eyes of mine 
take themselves to slomber, aile do gude service, 
or aile lig i' the grund for it ; ay, or go to death ; 120 
and aile pay it as valorously as I may, that sal I 
surely do, that if the breff and the loilg- : mary, I 
wad full fain heard some question 'tween you tway. 

Flu. Captain Macmorris, I think, look you, 
under your correction, there is not many of your 125 
nation 

Mac. Of my nation ! What ish my nation ? 
What ish my nation ? Who talks of my nation 
ish a villain and a bastard and a knave and a 
rascal. 130 

Flu. Look you, if you take the matter other- 
wise than is meant, Captain Macmorris, perad- 
venture I shall think you do not use me with that 
affability as in discretion you ought to use me, 
look you ; being as goot a man as yourself, both 135 
in the disciplines of wars and in the derivation of 
my birth and in other particularities. 

Mac. I do not know you so good a man as 
myself ; I will cut off your head. 

Gow. Gentlemen both, you will mistake each 140 
other. 



60 KING HENR V V. [act hi. 

Ja7ny. Au ! that's a foul fault. 

yA parley sounded. 

Gow. The town sounds a parley. 

Flu. Captain Macmorris, when there is more 

145 petter opportunity to be required, look you, I will 

be so pold as to tell you I know the disciplines of 

war ; and there is an end. \Exeunt. 

SCENE III. — The saine. Before the gates of 
Harfleur. 

The Governor and sojne Citizens on the walls ; the 
English Forces below. Enter King Henry ««^/z2> 
Train. 

• 
K, Hen. How yet resolves the governor of the 
town ? 
This is the latest parle we v/ill admit : 
Therefore to our best mercy give yourselves ; 
Or, like to men proud of destruction, 
5 Defy us to our worst : for, as I am a soldier, 
A name that in my thoughts becomes me best, 
If I begin the battery once again, 
I will not leave the half-achieved Harfleur 
Till in her ashes she lie buried. 
10 The gates of mercy shall be all shut up ; 

And the flesh'd soldier, rough and hard of heart. 
In liberty of bloody hand shall range 
With conscience wide as hell, mowing like grass 
Your fresh-fair virgins and your flowering infants. 
15 What is it then to me, if impious war, 

Array'd in flames like to the prince of fiends, • 
Do, with his smirched complexion, all fell feats 
Enlink'd to waste and desolation ? 



sc. III.] KING HENR V V. 6i 

What rein can hold Hcentious wickedness 

When down the hill he holds his herce career ? 2a 

We may as bootless spend our vain command 

Upon the enraged soldiers in their spoil 

As send precepts to the leviathan 

To come ashore. Therefore, ye men of Harfleur, 

Take pity of your town and of your people 25 

Whiles yet my soldiers are in my command ; 

Whiles yet the cool and temperate wind of grace 

O'erblows the filthy and contagious clouds 

Of heady murder, spoil, and villainy. 

If not, why, in a moment look to see 30 

The blind and bloody soldier with foul hand 

Defile the locks of your shrill-shrieking daughters ; 

Your fathers taken by the silver beards, 

And their most reverend heads dashed to the walls ; 

Your naked infants spitted upon pikes, 35 

Whiles the mad mothers with their howls confus'd 

Do break the clouds, as did the wives of Jewry 

At Herod's bloody-hunting slaughlfermen. 

What say you ? will you yield, and this avoid .? 

Or, guilty in defence, be thus destroy 'd } 40 

Gov. Our expectation hath this day an end : 
The Dauphin, whom of succors we entreated. 
Returns us that his powers are yet not ready 
To raise so great a siege. Therefore, great king, 
We yield our town and lives to thy soft mercy : 45 
Enter our gates ; dispose of us and ours ; 
For we no longer are defensible. 

K. Hen. Open your gates. — Come, Uncle 
Exeter, 
Go you and enter Harfleur ; there remain, 
And fortify it strongly 'gainst the French : 50 

Use mercy to them all. For us, dear uncle. 



62 KING HENRY V. [act iii. 

The winter coming on and sickness growing 
Upon our soldiers, we will retire to Calais. 
To-night in Harfleur will we be your guest ; 
^^ To-morrow for the march are we address'd. 

\_Flourish. The King, etc., enter the town. 



SCENE IV. — Rouen. A Room in the Palace. 

Enter Katharine aiid Alice. 

Kath. Alice, iu as ete en Angleterre, et tu 
paries Men le langage. 
Alice. Un peu, madame. 

Kath. Je te prie viejiseignerj il faut que 
Sfapprenne a parler. Cojn?nent appelez-vous la 
main eji Anglais ? 

Alice. La main f elle est appelee de hand. 
Kath. De hand. Et les doigts ? 
Alice. Les doigts? ma foi,foublie les doigts; 
lo mais je me souviendrai. Les doigts ? je pense 
quHls sojit appeles de fingres ; oui, de fingres. 

Kath. La maiti, de hand ; les doigts, de 
fingres. J e poise que je suis le bo7i ecolierj fai 
gagne deux mots d' Anglais viteiJient. Com- 
15 7neni appelez-vous les o?tgles ? 

Alice. Les ongles ? les appelons de nails. 
Kath. De nails. Ecoutez ; dites-moi, si je 
parte bien : de hand, de fingres, et de nails. 
Alice. Cest bien dit^ madame j il est fort 
20 bon Anglais. 

Kath. Dites-moi V A7tglais pour le bras. 
Alice. De arm, madame. 
Kath. Et le coude ? ^ 

Alice. De elbow. 



sc. IV.] KING HENR Y V. 63 

Kath. De elbow. Je nienfais la repetition 25 
de tous les mots que vous inaves appris des d 
present. 

Alice. II est trop difficile^ madame, covime 
je pense. 

Kath. Excusez-moi, Alice; ecoutez ; de 30 
hand, de fingres, de nails, de arm, de ilbow. 

Alice. De elbow, viadaine. 

Kath. O Seigneur Dieic, je in en oublie ! de 
elbow. Commejtt appelez-vous le col ? 

Alice. De neck, niadame. 35 

Kath. De nick. Et le inenton ? 

Alice. De chin. 

Kath. De sin. Le col, de nick ; le menton, 
de sin. 

Alice. Oui. Sauf voire honnetir, en verite,^o 
vous prononcez les mots aussi droit que les na- 
tifs dAngleterre. 

Kath. Je ne doute point d'apprendre, par la 
grace de Dieu, et en peu de temps. 

Alice. N'avez-vous pas dejd oublie ce que je ii^^ 
vous ai enseigne ? 

Kath. Non, je reciter ai a vous prcmpiementj 
de hand, de fingres, de mails — 

Alice. De nails, inadame. 

Kath, De nails, de arm, de ilbow — 50 

Alice. Sauf voire honiieur, de elbow. 

Kath. Ainsi dis-je ; de elbow, de nick, et de 
sin. Comment appelez-vous le pied et la robe? 

Alice. De foot, madamey ^/ de coun. 

Kath. De foot, et de coun ! O Seigneur Dieu, 55 
ces sont mots de son mauvais, corruptible, gros, 
et impudique, et 71011 pour les dames d'honneur 
d'user ; je ne voudrais prononcer ces mots de- 



64 KING HENR V V. [act hi. 

vant les seigneurs de France pour tout l& 
60 monde. II faut de foot, et de coun, neaninoins. 

Je reciterai une autre fois ma lefon ensejnble : 

de hand, de fingres, de nails, de arm, de elbow, 

de nick, de sin, de foot, 

Alice. Excellent, viadame ! 
65 Kath. Cest assez pour une fois : allons- 

nous a dijier. \Exeunt. 

SCENE V. — The same. Another Room i7t the 
same. 

Enter the French King, the Dauphin, Duke 
OF Bourbon, the Constable of France, 
and others. 

Fr. King. 'Tis certain he hath pass'd the river 

Somme. 
Con. And if he be not fought withal, my lord, 
Let us not live in France ; let us quit all. 
And give our vineyards to a barbarous people. 
5 Dau. O Dieu vivant I Shall a few sprays of us. 
Our scions, put in wild and savage stock. 
Spirt up so suddenly into the clouds. 
And overlook their grafters ? 

Bour. Normans, but bastard Normans, Nor- 
man bastards ! 
10 Mort de iiia vie ! if they march along 

Unfought withal, but I will sell my dukedom 
To buy a slobbery and a dirty farm 
In that nook-shotten isle of Albion. 

Con. Dieu de batailles ! where have they this 
mettle ? 
15 Is not their climate foggy, raw, and dull ; 



sc. v.] KING HENRY V. 65 

On whom, as in despite, the sun looks pale, 

Killing their fruit with frowns ? Can sodden water, 

A drench for sur-rein'd jades, their barley-broth, 

Decoct their cold blood to such valiant heat ? 

And shall our quick blood, spirited with wine, 20 

Seem frosty ? O, for honor of our land. 

Let us not hang like roping icicles 

Upon our houses' thatch, whiles a more frosty 

people 
Sweat drops of gallant youth in our rich fields ! — 
Poor we may call them in their native lords. 25 

Dan. By faith and honor, our madams mock 
at us ; 
And plainly say our mettle is bred out. 

Boiir. They bid us to the English dancing- 
schools. 
And teach lavoltas high and swift corantos ; 
Saying our grace is only in our heels, 30 

And that we are most lofty runaways, 

Fr. King. Where is Montjoy, the herald ? 
speed him hence ; 
Let him greet England with our sharp defiance. 
Up, princes ! and, with spirit of honor edg'd 
More sharper than your swords, hie to the field : 35 
Charles Delabreth, high constable of France ; 
You dukes of Orleans, Bourbon, and of Berri, 
Alengon, Brabant, Bar, and Burgundy ; 
Jacques Chatillon, Rambures, Vaudemont, ♦ 

Beaumont, Grandpre, Roussi, and Fauconberg, 40 
Foix, Lestrale, Bouciqualt, and Charolois ; 
High dukes, great princes, barons, lords, and 

knights. 
For your great seats now quit you of great 
shames. 



66 KING HENRY V. [act. hi. 

Bar Harry England, that sweeps through our 
land 
45 With pennons painted in the blood of Harfleur : 
Rush on his host, as doth the melted snow 
Upon the valleys, whose low vassal seat 
The Alps doth spit and void his rheum upon : 
Go down upon him, you have power enough, 
50 And in a captive chariot into Rouen 
Bring him our prisoner. 

Con. This becomes the great. 

Sorry am I his numbers are so few. 
His soldiers sick and famish 'd in their march, 
SS For I am sure, when he shall see our army. 
He'll drop his heart into the sink of fear. 
And for achievement offer us his ransom. 

Fr. King. Therefore, lord constable, haste on 
Montjoy ; 
And let him say to England that we send 
60 To know what willing ransom he will give. 

Prince Dauphin, you shall stay with us in Rouen. 
Dati. Not so, I do beseech your majesty. 
F?'. King. Be patient, for you shall remain 
with us. 
Now forth, lord constable and princes all, 
65 And quickly bring us word of England's fall. 

\Exeunt. 

SCENE VI. — The English Camp in Picardy. 
Enter, severally, Gower and Fluellen. 
Gow. How now, Captain Fluellen ! come you 
from the bridge ? 

Flu. I assure you there is very excellent ser- 
vices committed at the pridge. 
5 Gow. Is the Duke of Exeter safe ? 



sc. VI.] KING HENRY V. 67 

Flu. The Duke of Exeter is as magnanimous 
as Agamemnon ; and a man that I love and honor 
with my soul and my heart and my duty and my 
life and my Uving and my uttermost power : he is 
not (Got be praised and plessed !) any hurt in the 10 
'orld ; but keeps the pridge most vaHantly, with 
excellent discipline. There is an auncient lieu- 
tenant there at the pridge — I think in my very 
conscience he is as valiant a man as Mark Antony ; 
and he is a man of no estimation in the 'orld ; 15 
but I did see him do as gallant service. 

Gow. What do you call him ? 

Flu. He is called Auncient Pistol. 

Gow. I know him not. 

Flu. Here is the man. 20 

Enter PiSTOL. 

Pist. Captain, I thee beseech to do me favors : 
The Duke of Exeter doth love thee well. 

Flu. Ay, I praise Got ; and I have merited 
some love at his hands. 

Pist. Bardolph, a soldier firm and sound of heart, 25 
And of buxom valor, hath, by cruel fate, 
And giddy Fortune's furious fickle wheel, 
That goddess blind. 
That stands upon the rolling, restless stone — 

Fhi. By your patience, Auncient Pistol. Fort- 30 
une is painted plind ; with a muffler before her eyes, 
to signify to you that Fortune is plind : and she is 
painted also with a wheel to signify to you, which 
is the moral of it, that she is turning and incon- 
stant and mutability and variation : and her foot, 35 
look you, is fixed upon a spherical stone, which 
rolls and rolls and rolls. — In good truth, the poet 



68 KING HENRY V. [act iii. 

makes a most excellent description of it : Fortune 
is an excellent moral. ^ 

40 Pist. Fortune is Bardolph's foe, and frowns on 
him ; 
For he hath stolen a pax, and hanged must 'a be. 
Let gallows gape for dog, let man go free, 
And let not hemp his wind-pipe suffocate : 
But Exeter hath given the doom of death 
45 For pax of little price. 

Therefore, go speak ; the duke will hear thy voice ; 
And let not Bardolph's vital thread be cut 
With edge of penny cord and vile reproach : 
Speak, captain, for his life, and I will thee requite. 
50 Flu. Auncient Pistol, I do partly understand 
your meaning. 

Pist. Why then, rejoice therefore. 

Flu. Certainly, auncient, it is not a thing to 

rejoice at : for if, look you, he were my prother, I 

55 would desire the duke to use his goot pleasure, 

and put him to execution ; for discipline ought 

to be used. 

Pist. Die ; and figo for thy friendship ! 
Flu. It is well. 
60 Pist. The fig of Spain ! \Fxit. 

Pltc. Very goot. 

Gow. Why, this is an arrant counterfeit ras- 
cal ; I remember him now ; a cutpurse. 

Flu. I'll assure you, 'a uttered as prave 'ords 
65 at the pridge as you shall see in a summer's day. 
But it is very well ; what he has spoke to me, that 
is well, I warrant you, when time is serve. 

Gow. Why, 'tis a gull, a fool, a rogue, that 

now and then goes to the wars, to grace himself 

70 at his return into London under .the form of a 



sc. VI.] KING HENR V V. 69 

soldier. And such fellows are perfect in the 
great commanders' names : and they will learn 
you by rote where services were done ; — at such 
and such a sconce, at such a breach, at such a con- 
voy ; who came off bravely, who was shot, who 75 
disgraced, what terms the enemy stood on ; and 
this they con perfectly in the phrase of war, which 
they trick up with new-tuned oaths : and w^hat a 
beard of the general's cut and a horrid suit of the 
camp will do among foaming bottles and ale- 80 
washed wits is wonderful to be thought on. But 
you must learn to know such slanders of the age, 
or else you may be marvellously mistook. 

Flu. I tell you what. Captain Gower, I do 
perceive he is not the man that he would gladly 85 
make show to the 'orld he is ; if I find a hole in 
his coat, I will tell him my mind. [Drum within?\ 
Hark you, the king is coming, and I must speak 
with him from the pridge. 

Enter King Henry, Gloster, and Soldiers. 

Got pless your majesty 90 

K. Hen. How, now, Fluellen ! cam'st thou 
from the bridge ? 

Flu. Ay, so please your majesty. The Duke 
of Exeter has very gallantly maintained the 
pridge : the French is gone off, look you ; and 95 
there is gallant and most prave passages ; marry, 
th' athversar}^ was have possession of the pridge ; 
but he is enforced to retire, and the Duke of Ex- 
eter is master of the pridge ; I can tell your maj- 
esty the duke is a prave man. 100 

K. Hen, What men have you lost, Fluellen ? 

Flu. The perdition of th' athversary hath 



70 KING HENRY V. [act iii. 

been very great, reasonable great : marry, for my 
part, I think the duke hath lost never a man, but 

105 one that is like to be executed for robbing a 
church, one Bardolph, if your majesty know the 
man ; his face is all bubukles and whelks and 
knobs and flames of fire ; and his lips plows at his 
nose, and it is like a coal of fire, sometimes plue 

1 10 and sometimes red ; but his nose is executed, and 
his fire's out. 

K. Hen. We would have all such offenders so 
cut off: — and we give express charge that, in our 
marches through the country, there be nothing 

115 compelled from the villages, nothing taken but 
paid for, none of the French upbraided or abused 
in disdainful language ; for, when lenity and 
cruelty play for a kingdom, the gentler gamester 
is the soonest winner. 

Tucket sounds. Enter MONTJOY. 

120 Mont, You know me by my habit. 

K. Hen. Well then I know thee ; what shall I 
know of thee ? 

Mont. My master's mind. 
K. Hen. Unfold it. 

125 Mont. Thus says my king : — Say thou to Harry 
of England : Though we seemed dead, we did 
but sleep ; advantage is a better soldier than rash- 
ness. Tell him we could have rebuked him at 
Harfleur, but that we thought not good to bruise 

130 an injury till it were full ripe: — now we speak 
upon our cue, and our voice is imperial : England 
shall repent his folly, see his weakness, and ad- 
mire our sufferance. Bid him, therefore, consider 
of his ransom : which must proportion the losses 



sc. VI.] KING HENRY V. 71 

we have borne, the subjects we have lost, the dis- 135 
grace we have digested ; which in weight to re- 
answer, his pettiness would bow under. For our 
losses, his exchequer is too poor ; for the effusion 
of our blood, the muster of his kingdom too faint 
a number ; and for our disgrace, his own person, 140 
kneeling at our feet, but a weak and worthless 
satisfaction. To this add defiance : and tell him, 
for conclusion, he hath betrayed his followers, 
whose condemnation is pronounced. So far my 
king and master ; so much my office. 145 

K. He7i. What is thy name ? I know thy 

quality. 
Mont. Montjoy. 
K. Hen. Thou dost thy office fairly. Turn 

thee back. 
And tell thy king I do not seek him now ; 
But could be willing to march on to Calais 150 

Without impeachment : for, to say the sooth. 
Though 'tis no wisdom to confess so much 
Unto an enemy of craft and vantage, 
My people are with sickness much enfeebled. 
My numbers lessen'd, and those few I have 155 

Almost no better than so many French ; 
Who, when they were in health, I tell thee, 

herald, 
I thought upon one pair of English legs 
Did march three Frenchmen. — Yet, forgive me, 

God, 
That I do brag thus ! This your air of France 160 
Hath blown that vice in me ; I must repent. 
Go, therefore, tell thy master here I am ; 
My ransom is this frail and worthless trunk. 
My army but a weak and sickly guard ; 



72 KING HENRY V. [act in. 

165 Yet, God before, tell him we will come on, 

Though France himself and such another neigh- 
bour 
Stand in our way. There's for thy labor, Montjoy. 
Go, bid thy master well advise himself: 
If we may pass, we will ; if we be hinder'd, 
170 We shall your tawny ground with your red blood 
Discolor : and so, Montjoy, fare you well. 
The sum of all our answer is but this : 
We would not seek a battle, as we are ; 
Nor, as we are, we say we will not shun it ; 
175 So tell your master. 

Mont. I shall deliver so. Thanks to your high- 
ness. S^Exit. 
Glo. I hope they will not come upon us now. 
K. Hen. We are in God's hand, brother, not 
in theirs. 
March to the bridge ; it now draws toward night. 
180 Beyond the river we'll encamp ourselves, 
And on to-morrow bid them march away. 

^Exeunt. 

SCENE VII. — The French Camp, neur Agin- 
coiirt 

Enter the Constable of France, the Lord Ram- 
BURES, the Duke of Orleans, Dauphin, 
and others. 

Co7i. Tut ! I have the best armor of the world. 
Would it were day. 

Orl. You have an excellent armor ; but let my 
horse have his due. 
5 Con. It is the best horse of Europe. 

Orl. Will it never be morning ? 



sc. VII.] KING HENR Y V. 73 

Dati. My Lord of Orleans, and my lord high 
constable, you talk of horse and armor — 

Orl. You are as well provided of both as any 
prince in the world. 10 

Dau. What a long- night is this ! — I will not 
change my horse with any that treads but on four 
pasterns. Qa, ha ! He bounds from the earth 
as if his entrails were hairs ; le cheval volant, 
the Pegasus, qui a les narines de feu ! When I 15 
bestride him, I soar, I am a hawk : he trots the air ; 
the earth sings when he touches it ; the basest 
horn of his hoof is more musical than the pipe of 
Hermes. 

Orl. He's of the color of the nutmeg. 20 

Dau. And of the heat of the ginger. It is a 
beast for Perseus : he is pure air and tire ; and the 
dull elements of earth and water never appear in 
him, but only in patient stillness while his rider 
mounts him. He is indeed a horse ; and all other 25 
jades you may call beasts. 

Con. Indeed, my lord, it is a most absolute 
and excellent horse. 

Dau. It is the ]'»rince of palfreys ; his neigh is 
like the bidding of a monarch, and his counte- 30 
nance enforces homage. 

Orl. No more, cousin. 

Dau. Nay, the man hath no wit that cannot, 
from the rising of the lark to the lodging of the 
lamb, vary deserved praise on my palfrey. It is a ^S 
theme as fluent as the sea ; turn the sands into 
eloquent tongues, and my horse is argument 
for them all : 'tis a subject for a sovereign to rea- 
son on, and for a sovereign's sovereign to ride on ; 
and for the world, familiar to us and unknown, to 40 



74 KING HENR V V. [act hi. 

lay apart their particular functions and wonder at 
him. I once writ a sonnet in his praise, and be- 
gan thus : " Wonder of nature — " 

Orl. I have heard a sonnet begin so to one's 
45 mistress. 

Dau. Then did they imitate that which I com- 
posed to my courser, for my horse is my mistress. 
Co7t. Nay, methought yesterday your mistress 
shrewdly shook your back. 
50 Dau. So, perhaps, did yours. 
Con. Mine was not bridled. 
Dati. O ! then belike she was old and gentle ; 
and you rode, like a kern of Ireland, your French 
hose off, and in your strait strossers. 
55 Co?i. You have good judgment in horseman- 
ship. 

Ram. My lord constable, the armor that I saw 
in your tent to-night, are those stars or suns upon 
it? 
60 Con. Stars, my lord. 

Dau. Some of them will fall to-morrow, I hope. 
Con. And yet my sky shall not want. 
Dau. That may be, for you bear a many su- 
perfluously, and 'twere more honor some were 
65 away. 

Con. Even as your horse bears your praises ; 
who would trot as well were some of your brags 
dismounted. 

Dau. Would I were able to load him with 
70 his desert ! Will it never be day ? I will trot to- 
morrow a mile, and my way shall be paved with 
English faces. 

Co7i. I will not say so, for fear I should be 
faced out of my way. But I would it were morn- 



sc. VII.] KING HENR Y F. 75 

ing, for I would fain be about the ears of the 75 
Enghsh. 

Ra7n. Who will go to hazard with me for 
twenty prisoners ? 

Co7i. You must first go yourself to hazard, ere 
you have them. 80 

Dau. 'Tis midnight, I'll go arm myself. \Exit. 

Orl. The Dauphin longs for morning. 

Rain. He longs to eat the English. 

Con. I think he will eat all he kills. 

Orl. By the white hand of my lady, he's a gal- 85 
lant prince. 

Co7i Swear by her toot, that she may tread out 
the oath. 

Orl. He is simply the most active gentleman 
of France. 90 

Con. Doing is activity ; and he will still be 
doing. 

Orl. He never did harm, that I heard of. 

Con. Nor will do none to-morrow : he will 
keep that good name still. 95 

Orl. I know him to be valiant. 

Con. I was told that by one that knows him 
better than you. 

Orl. What's he ? 

Con. Marry, he told me so himself ; and he 100 
said he cared not who knew it. 

Orl. He needs not, it is no hidden virtue in him. 

Con. By my faith, sir, but it is ; never anybody 
saw it but his lackey : 'tis a hooded valor ; and, 
when it appears, it will bate. 105 

Orl. Ill-will never said well. 

Con. I will cap that proverb with — There is 
flattery in friendship. 



75 KING HENRY V. [act iii. 

Orl. And I will take up that with — Give the 
no devil his due. 

Co7t. Well placed ; there stands your friend 
for the devil : have at the very eye of that proverb 
with — A plague of the devil. 

Orl. You are the better at proverbs, by how 
115 much — A fool's bolt is soon shot. 
Con. You have shot over. 
Orl. 'Tis not the first time you were overshot. 

Enter a Messenger. 

Mess. My Lord high constable, the English 
lie within fifteen hundred paces of your tents. 
120 Coji. Who hath measured the ground ? 
Mess. The Lord Grandpre. 
Con. A valiant and most expert gentleman. — 
Would it were day ! — Alas, poor Harry of Eng- 
land ! he longs not for the dawning as we do. 
125 Orl. What a wretched and peevish fellow is 
this king of England, to mope with his fat-brained 
followers so far out of his knowledge ! 

Con. If the English had any apprehension, 
they would run away. 
130 Orl. That they lack ; for, if their heads had 
any intellectual armor, they could never wear 
such heavy head-pieces. 

Ram. That island of England breeds very 
valiant creatures ; their mastiffs are of unmatch- 
J35 able courage. 

Orl. Foolish curs, that run winking into the 

mouth of a Russian bear, and have their heads 

crushed like rotten apples ! You may as well say 

that's a valiant flea that dare eat his breakfast on 

140 the lip of a lion. 



PROLOGUE.] KING HENRY V. 77 

Con. Just, just ; and the men do sympathise 
with the mastiffs in robustious and rough coming 
on, leaving their wits with their wives : and then 
give them great meals of beef and iron and steel, 
they will eat like Avolves and fight like devils. 145 

Or I. Ay, but these English are shrewdly out 
of beef. 

Con. Then shall we find to-morrow they have 
only stomachs to eat and none to fight. Now is 
it time to arm : come, shall we about it ? 150 

Orl. It is now two o'clock ; but, let me see, 
by ten, 
We shall have each a hundred Englishmen. 

[Exeunt. 



ACT IV. 

Prologue. 

Enter Chorus. 

Cho. Now entertain conjecture of a time 
When creeping murmur and the poring dark 
Fills the wide vessel of the universe. 
From camp to camp, through the foul womb of 

night, 
The hum of either army stilly sounds, . 5 

That the fix'd sentinels almost receive 
The secret whispers of each other's watch. 
Fire answers fire ; and through their paly flames 
Each battle sees the other's umber'd face : 
Steed threatens steed, in high and boastful neighs 10 
Piercing the night's dull ear ; and from the tents, 



78 KING HENRY V, [act iv. 

The armorers, accomplishing the knights, 
With busy hammers closing rivets up, 
Give dreadful note of preparation. 

15 The country cocks do crow, the clocks do toll, 
And the third hour of drovs/-sy morning name. 
Proud of their numbers and secure in soul, 
The confident and over-lusty F'rench 
Do the lov/-rated English play at dice ; 

20 And chide the cripple tardy-gaited night, 
Who, like a foul and ugly witch, doth limp 
So tediously away. The poor condemned English, 
Like sacrifices, by their watchful fires 
Sit patiently, and inly ruminate 

25 The morning's danger ; and their gesture sad, 
Investing lank-lean cheeks and war-worn coats, 
Presenteth them unto the gazing moon 
So many horrid ghosts. O now, who will behold 
The royal captain of this ruin'd band 

30 Walking from watch to watch, from tent to tent, 
Let him cry, " Praise and glory on his head !" 
For forth he goes and visits all his host, 
Bids them good-morrow with a modest smile. 
And calls them brothers, friends, and countrymen. 

35 Upon his royal face there is no note 

How dread an army hath enrounded him ; 
Nor doth he dedicate one jot of color 
Unto the weary and all-watched night ; 

^ But freshly looks, and overbears attaint 

40 With cheerful semblance and sweet majesty ; 
That every wretch, pining an-d pale before, 
Beholding him, plucks comfort from his looks : 
A largess universal like the sun 
His liberal eye doth give to every one, 

45 Thawing cold fear that mean and gentle all 



sc. I.] KING HENR Y V. 79 

Behold, as may unworthiness define, 
A little touch of Harry in the night. 
And so our scene must to the battle fly ; 
Where (O for pity !) we shall much disgrace. 
With four or five most vile and ragged foils, 50 

Right ill-dispos'd in brawl ridiculous, 
The name of Agincourt. Yet, sit and see, 
Minding true things by what their mockeries be. 

[Exit. 

SCENE I. — The English Camp at Agincotirt. 

Enter King Henry, Bedford, and Gloster. 

K. Heii. Gloster, 'tis true that we are in great 
danger ; 
The greater therefore shoukl our courage be. 
Good-morrow, brother Bedford. God Almighty ! 
There is some soul of goodness in things evil, 
Would men observingly distil it out. 5 

For our bad neighbour makes us early stirrers, 
Which is both healthful and good husbandry : 
Besides, they are our outward consciences, 
And preachers to us all, admonishing 
That we should dress us fairly for our end. ^° 

Thus may we gather honey from the weed. 
And make a moral of the devil himself. 

Enter Erpingham. ' 

Good-morrow, old Sir Thomas Erpingham : 
A good soft pillow for that good white head 
Were better than a churlish turf of France. 15 

Erp. Not so, my liege ; this lodging likes me 
better, 
Since I may say, " Now lie I like a king." 



So KING HENRY V. [act iv. 

K. He7i. 'Tis good for men to love their pres- 
ent pains 
Upon example ; so the spirit is eas'd : 
20 And, when the mind is quicken'd, out of doubt 
The- organs, though defunct and dead before. 
Break up their drowsy grave, and newly move 
With casted slough and fresh legerity. 
Lend me thy cloak, Sir Thomas. — Brothers both, 
25 Commend me to the princes in our camp ; 
Do my good-morrow to them ; and anon 
Desire them all to my pavilion. 
Glo. We shall, my liege. 

[Exeunt Gloster and Bedford. 
Erp. Shall I attend your grace ? 
30 K. Hen. No, my good knight ; 

Go with my brothers to my lords of England : 
I and my bosom must debate awhile, 
And then I would no other company. 

Erp. The Lord in heaven bless thee, noble 
Harry! [£',rzV Erpingham. 

35 K. Hen. God-a-mercy, old heart ! thou speak'st 
cheerfully. 

Enter Pistol. 

Plst. Qui va Id ? 

K. Hen. A friend. 

Pist. Discuss unto me ; art thou officer ? 
Or art thou base, common, and popular ? 
40 K. Hen. I am a gentleman of a company. 

Pist. Trail'st thou the puissant pike ? 

K. Hen. Even so. What are you ? 

Pist. As good a gentleman as the emperor. 

K. Hen. Then you are a better than the king. 
45 Pist, The king's a bawcock, and a heart of gold. 



sc. I.] KING HENR Y V. 8i 

A lad of lite, an imp of fame ; 

Of parents good, of fist most valiant, 

I kiss his dirty shoe, and from heart string 

I love the lovely bully. What's thy name ? 

K. Hen. Harry le Roi. 50 

Pist. Le Roy ! a Cornish name ; art thou of 
Cornish crew ? 

K. Hen. No, I am a Welshman. 

Pist. Knowest thou Fluellen .'' 

K. Hen. Yes. 

Pist. Tell him I'll knock his leek about his 
pate 55 

Upon Saint Davy's day. 

K. Hen. Do not you wear your dagger in your 
cap that day, lest he knock that about yours, 

Pist. Art thou his friend ? 

K. Hen. And his kinsman too. 60 

Pist. T\\^figo for thee, then ! 

K. Hen. I thank you : God be with you ! 

Pist. My name is Pistol called, \Exit. 

K. Hen. It sorts well with your fierceness. 

Enter Fluellen atid Gower, severally. 

Gow. Captain Fluellen ! 65 

Flu. So ! if. the name of all goodness, speak 
lower. It is the greatest admiration in the uni- 
versal 'orld when the true and auncient preroga- 
tifs and laws of the wars is not kept : if you would 
take the pains but to examine the wars of Pompey 70 
the Great, you shall find, I warrant you, that there 
is no tiddle-taddle nor pibble-pabble in Pompey 's 
camp ; I warrant you, you shall find the ceremo- 
nies of the wars and the cares of it and the forms 



82 KING HENR V F. [act iv. 

y^ of it and the sobriety of it and the modesty of it 
to be otherwise. 

Gow. Why, the enemy is loud : you hear him 
all night. 

J^/u. If the enemy is an ass and a fool and a 

80 prating coxcomb, is it meet, think you, that we 

should also, look you, be an ass and a fool and a 

prating coxcomb ? in your own conscience, now ? 

Gow. I will speak lower. 

/7z/. I pray you and beseech you that you will. 
\Exeunt Gower and Fluellen. 
85 K. Hen. Though it appear a little out of fashion, 
there is much care and valor in this Welshman, 

Enter three soldiers, Bates, Court, and 
Williams. 

Court. Brother John Bates, is not that the 
morning which breaks yonder ? 
Bates. I think it be : but we have no great 
90 cause to desire the approach of day. 

Will. We see yonder the beginning of the day, 
but I think we shall never see the end of it. — Who 
goes there ? 

K. Hen. A friend. 
95 Will. Under what captain serve you ? 
K. Hen. Under Sir Thomas Erpingham. 
Will. A good old commander and a most kind 
gentleman :I pray you, what thinks he of our estate? 
K. Hen. Even as men wrecked upon a sand, 
100 that look to be washed off the next tide. 

Bates. He hath not told his thought to the king ? 

K. Hen. No ; nor it is not meet he should. 

For, though I speak it to you, I think the king is 

but a man, as I am ; the violet smells to him as it 



sc. I.] KING HENR V V. 83 

doth to me ; the element shows to him as it doth 105 
to me ; all his senses have but human condi- 
tions : his ceremonies laid by, in his nakedness he 
appears but a man ; and though his affections are 
higher mounted than ours, yet, when they stoop, 
they stoop with the like wing. Therefore, when no 
he sees reason of fears, as we do, his fears out of 
doubt be of the same relish as ours are : yet in 
reason no man should possess him with any ap- 
pearance of fear, lest he, byshowmg it, should dis- 
hearten his army. 115 

Bates. He may show what outward courage 
he will : but, I believe, as cold a night as 'tis, he 
could wish himself in Thames up to the neck ; 
and so I would he were, and I by him, at all ad- 
ventures, so we were quit here. 120 

K. Hen. By my troth, I will speak my con- 
science of the king ; I think he would not wish 
himself anywhere but where he is. 

Bates. Then I would he were here alone ; so 
should he be sure to be ransomed, and a many 125 
poor men's lives saved. 

K. Hen. I dare say you love him not so ill to 
wish him here alone, howsoever you speak this to 
feel other men's minds. Methinks I could not die 
anywhere so contented as in the king's company ; 130 
his cause being just and his quarrel honorable. 

Will. That's more than we know. 

Bates. Ay, or more than we should seek after ; 
for we know enough if we know we are the king's 
subjects ; if his cause be wrong, our obedience to 135 
the king wipes the crime of it out of us. 

Will. But, if the cause be not good, the king 
himself hath a heavy reckoning to make, when all 



84 KING HENRY V. [act IV. 

those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in a 

140 battle, shall join together at the latter day, and 
cry all, " We died at such a place ; " some swear- 
ing, some crying for a surgeon, some upon their 
wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts 
they owe, some upon their children rawly left. I 

145 am afeard there are few die well that die in a 
battle ; for how can they charitably dispose of 
anything when blood is their argument ? Now, 
if these men do not die well, it will be a black 
matter for the king that led them to it ; whom to 

1 50 disobey were against all proportion of subjection. 

K. Hen. So, if a son that is by his father sent 

about merchandise do sinfully miscarry upon the 

sea, the imputation of his wickedness, by your 

rule, should be imposed upon his father that sent 

155 him : or, if a servant, under his master's command 
transporting a sum of money, be assailed by rob- 
bers and die in many irreconciled iniquities, you 
may call the business of the master the author of 
the servant's damnation. But this is not so : the 

160 king is not bound to answer the particular end- 
ings of his soldiers, the father of his son, nor the 
master of his servant ; for they purpose not their 
death when they purpose their services. Besides, 
there is no king, be his cause never so spotless, if 

165 it come to the abitrement of swords, can try it 
out with all unspotted soldiers. Some, peradven- 
ture, have on them the guilt of premeditated and 
contrived murder ; some, of beguiling virgins with 
the broken seals of perjury ; some, making the 

1 70 wars their bulwark, that have before gored the 
gentle bosom of peace with pillage and robbery. 
Now, if these men have defeated the law and out- 



sc. I] KING HENRY V, 85 

run native punishment, though they can outstrip 
men, they have no wings to fly from God : war is 
his beadle, war is his vengeance ; so that here 175 
men are punished for before-breach of the king's 
laws in now the king's quarrel : where they feared 
the death, they have borne life away ; and, where 
they would be safe, they perish : then, if they die 
unprovided, no more is the king guilty of their 180' 
damnation than he was before guilty of those im- 
pieties for the which they are now visited. Every 
subject's duty is the king's ; but every subject's soul 
is his own. Therefore should every soldier in the 
wars do as every^ sick man in his bed, wash every 185 
mote out of his conscience : and, dying so, death 
is to him advantage ; or, not dying, the time was 
blessedly lost wherein such preparation was 
gained : and in him that escapes it were not sin 
to think that, making God so free an offer, he let 190 
him outlive that day to see his greatness and to 
teach others how they should prepare. 

Will. 'Tis certain, every man that dies ill, the 
ill is upon his own head, the king is not to answer it. 

Bates. I do not desire he should answer for 195 
me ; and yet I determine to fight lustily for him. 

K. Hen. I myself heard the king say he would 
not be ransomed. 

Will. Ay, he said so to make us fight cheer- 
fully : but, when our throats are cut, he may be 200 
ransomed, and we ne'er the wiser. 

K. Hen. If I live to see it, I will never trust 
his word after. 

Will. You pay him then ! That's a perilous 
shot out of an elder-gun, that a poor and a pri- 205 
vate displeasure can do against a monarch ! you 



86 KING HENRY V. [act IV. 

may as well go about to turn the sun to ice with 
fanning in his face with a peacock's feather. You'll 
never trust his word after ! come, 'tis a foolish 
2IO saying. 

K. Hen. Your reproof is something too round ; 
I should be angry with you, if the time were 
convenient. 

Will. Let it be a quarrel between us, if you livej 
215 A". Hen. I embrace it. 

Will. How shall I know thee again ? 
K. Hen. Give me any gage of thine, and I 
will wear it in my bonnet : then, if ever thou dar- 
est acknowledge it, I will make it my quarrel. 
220 Will. Here's my glove ; give me another of 
thine. 

K. Hen. There. 

Will. This will I also wear in my cap ; if ever 
thou come to me and.say, after to-morrow, " This 
225 is my glove," by this hand, I will take thee a box 
on the ear. 

K. Hen. If ever I live to see it, I will challenge it. 
Will. Thou darest as well be hanged. 
K. Hen. Well, I will do it, though I take thee 
230 in the king's company. 

Will. Keep thy word : fare thee well. 
Bates. Be friends, you English fools, be 
friends ; we have French quarrels enow, if you 
could tell how to reckon. 
235 K. Hen. Indeed, the French may lay twenty 
French crowns to one they will beat us ; for they 
bear them on their shoulders : but it is no Eng- 
lish treason to cut French crowns ; and to-mor- 
row the king himself will be a clipper. 

\Exeunt Soldiers. 



SCI. I.] KING HENRY V. 87 

Upon the king ! let us our lives, our souls, 240 

Our debts, our careful wives, 

Our children, and our sins lay on the king ! 

We must bear all. O hard condition ! 

Twin-born with greatness, subject to the breath 

Of every fool, whose sense no more can feel 245 

But his own wringing ! What infinite heart's-ease 

Must kings neglect, that private men enjoy ! 

And what have kings that privates have not too. 

Save ceremony — save general ceremony ? 

And what art thou, thou idol ceremony ? 250 

What kind of god art thou, that suffer'st more 

Of mortal griefs than do thy worshippers ? 

What are thy rents ? what are thy comings-in ? 

ceremony, show me but thy worth ! 

What is thy soul of adoration ? 255 

Art thou aught else but place, degree, and form. 

Creating awe and fear in other men ? 

Wherein thou art less happy being feared 

Than they in fearing. 

What drink'st thou oft, instead of homage sweet, 260 

But poison'd flattery ? O, be sick, great great- 
ness, 

And bid thy ceremony give thee cure ! 

Think'st thou the fiery fever will go out 

With titles blown from adulation ? 

Will it give place to flexture and low bending ? 265 

Canst thou, when thou command'st the beggar's 
knee. 

Command the health of it ? No, thou proud 
dream, 

That play'st so subtly with a king's repose : 

1 am a king that find thee; and I know 

'Tis not the balm, the sceptre, and the ball, 270 



88 KIXG HENRY V, [act iv. 

The sword, the mace, the crown imperial. 
The inter-tissu'cl robe of gold and pearl, 
The farced title running 'fore the king. 
The throne he sits on, nor the tide of pomp 

275 That beats upon the high shore of this world, — 
No, not all these, thrice gorgeous ceremony, 
Not all these, laid in bed majestical, 
Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave. 
Who with a body fiU'd and vacant mind 

280 Gets him to rest, cramm'd with distressful bread : 
Never sees horrid night, the child of hell. 
But, like a lackey, from the rise to set 
Sweats in the eye of Phoebus, and all night 
Sleeps in Elysium ; next day after dawn, 

285 Doth rise and help Hyperion to his horse ; 
And follows so the ever-running year 
With profitable labor to his grave : 
And, but for ceremony, such a wretch. 
Winding up days with toil and nights with sleep, 

290 Had the fore-hand and vantage of a king. 
The slave, a member of the country's peace, 
Enjoys it ; but in gross brain little wots 
What v/atch the king keeps to maintain the peace, 
Whose hours the peasant best advantages. 

Enter Erpingham. 

295 Erp. My lord, your nobles, jealous of your ab- 
sence. 
Seek through your camp to find you. 

K. Hen. Good old knight, 

Collect them all together at my tent : 
I'll be before thee. 
300 Erp, I shall do't, my lord. [Exit. 



sc. II.] KING HENRY V. 89 

K. Hen. O God of battles ! steel my soldiers' 

hearts ! 
Possess them not with fear! Take from them now 
The sense of reckoning, if the opposed numbers 
Pluck their hearts from them ! — Not to-day, O 

Lord, 
O, not to-day, think not upon the fault 305 

My father made in compassing the crown ! 
I Richard's body have interred new ; 
And on it have bestow'd more contrite tears 
Than from it issu'd forced drops of blood. 
Five hundred poor I have in yearly pay, 310 

Who twice a day their wither'd hands hold up 
Toward heaven to pardon blood ; and I have 

built 
Two chantries, where the sad and solemn priests 
Sing still for Richard's soul. More will I do ; 
Though all that I can do is nothing worth, 315 

Since that my penitence comes after all, 
Imploring pardon. 

Enter Gloster. 

Glo. My liege ! 

K. Hen. My brother Gloster's voice ? — Ay ; 
I know thy errand, I will go with thee : — 320 

The day, my friends, and all things stay for me. 

\_Exeti7it. 

SCENE 11.-77/^ French Camp. 

Enter Dauphin, Orleans, Rameures, and 
others. 

Or I. The sun doth gild our armor ; up, my 
lords. 



90 KING HENR V V. [act iv. 

Dau. Montez a cheval : — My horse ! varlet ! 
laquais ! ha ! 
5 Orl. O brave spirit ! 

Dau. Via ! les eaux et la terre — 
Orl. Rien puis ? Vair et le feti — 
Dau. Ceil ! cousin Orleans, — 

Enter Constable. 

Now, my lord constable ! 
lo Con. Hark, how our steeds for present service 
neigh. 

Dau. Mount them, and make incision in their 
hides. 
That their hot blood may spin in "English eyes, 
And dout them with superfluous courage : ha ! 
15 Ram. What, will you have them weep our 
horses' blood ? 
How shall we then behold their natural tears ? 

Enter a Messenger. 

Mess. The English are embattled, you French 
peers. 

Con. To horse, you gallant princes ! straight 
to horse ! 
20 Do but behold yon poor and starved band. 
And your fair show shall suck away their souls, 
Leaving them but the shales and husks of men. 
There is not work enough for all our hands ; 
Scarce blood enough in all their sickly veins 
25 To give each naked curtle-axe a stain, 

That our French gallants shall to-day draw out. 
And sheathe for lack of sport : let us but blow on 

them. 
The vapor of our valor will o'erturn them. 



sc. II.] KING HENR Y V. 91 

'Tis positive 'gainst all exceptions, lords, 

That our superfluous lackeys and our peasants, 30 

Who in unnecessary action swarm 

About our squares of battle, were enow 

To purge this field of such a hilding foe, 

Though we upon this mountain's basis by 

Took stand for idle speculation : 35 

But that our honors must not. What's to say ? 

A very little little let us do, 

And all is done. Then let the trumpets sound 

The tucket-sonance and the note to mount : 

For our approach shall so much dare the field 40 

That England shall couch down in fear and yield. 

Eiiter GRANDPRfi. 

Grajtd. Why do you stay so long, my lords of 

France ? 
Yon island carrions, desperate of their bones, 
Ill-favor'dly become the morning field : 
Their ragged curtains poorly are let loose, 45 

And our air shakes them passing scornfully. 
Big Mars seems bankrupt in their beggar'cl host. 
And faintly through a rusty beaver peeps. 
The horsemen sit like fixed candlesticks. 
With torch-staves in their hand; and their poor 

jades 50 

Lob down their heads, dropping the hides and 

hips, 
The gum down-roping from their pale-dead eyes. 
And in their pale, dull mouths the gimmal-bit 
Lies foul with chew'd grass, still and motionless ; 
And their executors, the knavish crows, 55 

Fly o'er them, all impatient for their hour. 
Description cannot suit itself in words 



92 KING HENR V V. [act iv. 

To demonstrate the life of such a battle 
In life so lifeless as it shows itself. 
60 Con. They have said their prayers, and they 
stay for death. 
Dati. Shall we go send them dinners and 
fresh suits, 
And give their fasting horses provender, 
And after fight with them } 

Con. I stay but for my guidon. To the field ! — 
65 I will the banner from a trumpet take, 

And use it for my haste. Come, come, away ! 
The sun is high, and we outwear the day. [Exeu7ti. 

SCENE lU.— TkeEjiglish Camp. 

Enter the English Host j Gloster, Bedford, 
Exeter, Salisbury, and Westmoreland. 

Glo. Where is the king ? 

Bed. The king himself is rode to view their 

battle. 
West. Of fighting-men they have full three- 
score thousand. 
Exe. There's five to one ; besides, they all are 
fresh. 
5 Sal. God's arm strike with us ! 'tis a fearful 
odds. 
God be wi' you, princes all ; I'll to my charge ; 
If we no more meet till we meet in heaven. 
Then, joyfully ; — my noble Lord of Bedford, 
My dear Lord Gloster, and my good Lord Exeter, 
10 And my kind kinsman — warriors all, adieu ! 

Bed. Farewell, good Salisbury; and good luck 
ofo with thee ! 



sc. III.] KING HENR Y V, 93 

Exe. Farewell, kind lord, tight valiantly to- 
day ; 
And yet I do thee wrong to mind thee of it. 
For thou art fram'd of the firm truth of valor. 

\Exit Salisbury. 
Bed. He is as full of valor as of kindness ; 15 

Princely in both. 

West. O, that we now had here 



Enter King Henry. 

But one ten thousand of those men in England 
That do no work to-day ! 

R. Hen. What's he that wishes so ? 20 

My cousin Westmoreland ? — No, my fair cousin : 
If we are marked to die, we are enow 
To do our country loss ; and, if to live, 
The fewer men the greater share of honor, 
God's will ! I pray thee, wish not one man more. 25 
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold. 
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost ; 
It yearns me not if men my garments wear ; 
Such outward things dwell not in my desires : 
But, if it be a sin to covet honor, 30 

I am the most offending soul alive. 
No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England : 
God's peace ! 1 would not lose so great an honor 
As one man more, methinks, would share from 

me 
For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one 

more. 35 

Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my 

host, 
That he which hath no stomach to this fight. 



94 KING HENRY V. [act iv. 

Let him depart ; his passport shall be made» 
And crowns for convoy put into his purse : 

40 We would not die in that man's company 
That fears his fellowship to die with us. 
This day is call'd the feast of Crispian. 
He that outlives this day and comes safe home 
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam'd, 

45 And rouse him at the name of Crispian. 
He that shall live this day and see old age 
Will yearly, on the vigil, feast his neighbours, 
And say, " To-morrow is Saint Crispian : " 
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars, 

50 And say, " These wounds I had on Crispin's day." 
Old men forget ; yet all shall be forgot, 
But he'll remember with advantages 
What feats he did that day : then shall our names, 
Familiar in their mouths as household words^ — 

55 Harry the king, Bedford and Exeter, 

Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloster — 
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember'd. 
This story shall the good man teach his son ; 
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by, 

60 From this day to the ending of the world, 
But we in it shall be remembered — 
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers ; 
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me 
Shall be my brother ; be he ne'er so vile, 

65 This day shall gentle his condition : 
And gentlemen in England now a-bed 
Shall think themselves accurs'd they were not 

here ; 
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any 

speaks 
That fought with us upon St. Crispin's day. 



sc. III.] KING HENRY V. 95 

Re-enter Salisbury. 

SaL My sovereign lord, bestow yourself with 
speed : 70 

The French are bravely in their battles set, 
And will with all expedience charge on us. 
K. Hc7i. All things are ready, if our minds be 

so. 
West. Perish the man whose mind is back- 
ward now. 
K. Hen. Thou dost not wish more help from 

England, coz ? 75 

West. God's will ! my liege, would you and I 
alone, 
Without more help, could fight this royal battle ! 
K. Hen. Why, now thou hast unwish'd live 
thousand men ; 
Which likes me better than to wish us one. 
You know your places : God be with you all ! 80 

Tucket. Enter Montjoy. 

Mont. Once more I come to know of thee. King 
Harry, 
If for thy ransom thou wilt now compound, 
Before thy most assured overthrow : 
For certainly thou art so near the gulf 
Thou needs must be englutted. Besides, in mercy, 85 
The Constable desires thee thou wilt mind 
Thy followers of repentance : that their souls 
May make a peaceful and a sweet retire 
From off these fields, where, wretches, their poor 

bodies 
Must lie and fester. 90 

K. Hen. Who hath sent thee now ? 



96 KING HENRY V. [act iv. 

Mont. The Constable of France. 
K. Heii. I pray thee, bear my former answer 
back ; 
Bid them achieve me and then sell my bones. 
95 Good God ! why should they mock poor fellows 
thus? 
The man that once did sell the lion's skin, 
While the beast liv'd, was kill'd while hunting 

him. 
A many of our bodies shall no doubt 
Find native graves ; upon the which, I trust, 
loo Shall witness live in brass of this day's work : 
And those that leave their valiant bones in France, 
Dying like men, though buried in your dunghills, 
They shall be fam'd ; for there the sun shall greet 

them. 
And draw their honors reeking up to heaven, 
105 Leaving their earthly parts to choke your clime, 
The smell whereof shall breed a plague in France. 
Mark then abounding valor in our English, 
That, being dead, like to the bullet's grazing, 
Break out into a second course of mischief, 
1 10 Killing in relapse of mortality. 

Let me speak proudly : — tell the Constable 
We are but warriors for the working-day: 
Our gayness and our gilt are all besmirch'd 
With rainy marching in the painful field ; 
115 There's not a piece of feather in our host — 
Good argument, I hope, we will not fly — 
And time hath worn us into slovenry : 
But, by the mass, our hearts are in the trim ; 
And my poor soldiers tell me yet ere night 
120 They'll be in fresher robes, or they will pluck 
The gay new coats o'er the French soldiers' heads, 



sc. IV.] KING HENR Y V. 97 

And turn them out of service. If they do this — 
As, if God please, they shall, — my ransom then 
Will soon be levied. Herald, save thou thy labor ; 
Come thou no more for ransom, gentle herald ; 125 
They shall have none, I swear, but these my joints ; 
Which if they have as I will leave 'em them, 
Shall yield them little, tell the Constable. 

Mont. I shall. King Harry. And so fare thee 
well : 
Thou never shalt hear herald any more. [Exit. 1 30 

K. Hen. I fear thou'lt once more come again 
for ransom. 

Enter the DUKE OF York. 

York. My lord, most humbly on my knee I beg 
The leading of the vaward. 

K. Hen. Take it, brave York. — Now, soldiers, 
march away : 
And how thou pleasest, God, dispose the day ! ^35 

\Exetint. 

SCENE IV.— 77^^ Field of Battle. 

Alaricms; Excursions. Enter French Soldier, 
Pistol, and Boy. 

Pist. Yield, cur 1 

Fr. Sol. Je pense que vous etes le gejitil- 
homme de bonne qualite. 

Pist. Quality ! Callino, castore me ! Art thou 
a gentleman ? What is thy name ? discuss. 5 

Fr. Sol. O Seigneur Dieu ! 

Pist. O, Signieur Dew should be a gentleman :■ — 
Perpend my words, O Signieur Dew, and mark ; — 



98 KING HENRY V. [act iv. 

O Signieur Dew, thou diest on point of fox, 
lo Except, O signieur, thou dost give to me 
Egregious ransom. 

Fr. Sol. O, pretmez inisiricorde ! ayez pitie 

de 7noi ! 
Pist. Moy shall not serve, I will have forty 
moys ; 
Or I will fetch thy rim out at thy throat 
15 In drops of crimson blood. 

Fr. Sol. Est-il impossible dechapper la force 
de ton bras ? 

Pist. Brass, cur ! 
Thou shameless and luxurious mountain goat, 
20 Offer'st me brass .f* 

Fr. Sol. O, pardonnez inoi ! 
Pist. Say'st thou me so ? is that a ton of moys ? 
Come hither, boy : ask me this slave in French 
What is his name. 
25 Boy. £lcoutez J comment etes vous appele ? 
Fr. Sol. Monsieur le Fer. 
Boy. He says his name is Master Fer. 
Pist. Master Fer ! I'll fer him and firk him and 
ferret him : — discuss the same in French unto him. 
30 Boy. I do not know the French for fer and 
ferret and firk. 

Pist. Bid him prepare, for I will cut his throat. 
Fr. Sol. Que dit-il, monsieur f 
Boy. II me commatide de vous dire que vous 
2,^ faites vous pret ; car ce soldat ici est dispose 
tout d cette heiire de couper voire gorge. 

Pist. Oui, couper la gorge, par mafoi. 
Peasant, unless thou give me crowns, brave 

crowns : 
Or mangled shalt thou be by this my sword,. 



sc. IV.] KING HENRY V. 99 

Fr. Sol. 0,je voiis supplie,pour V amour de \o 
Dieu, me pardonner ! Je suis gefitilhomme de 
bonne maison j gardez ma vie, et je voiis don- 
nerai deux cejit ecus. 

Pist. What are his words ? 

Boy. He prays you to save his life : he is a 45 
gentleman of a good house ; and for his ransom 
he will give you two hundred crowns. 

Pist. Tell him my fury shall abate, and I 
The crowns will take. 

Fr. Sol. Petit inonsietcr, que dit-il? 50 

Boy. Encore qiiil est contre son jurement de 
pardonner aucun prisonnier; neanmoins, pour 
les ecus que vous Vavez promis, il est content 
de vous donner la liberie, le franchisement. 

Fr. Sol. Sur mes genoux je vous donne mille 55 
remercimens ; et je inestime heureux que je 
suis tombe entre les mains d'un chevalier, je 
pense, le plus brave, vaillajit., et ires distingue 
seigneur d'Angleterre. 

Pist. Expound unto me, boy. 60 

Boy. He gives you, upon his knees, a thousand 
thanks : and he esteems himself happy that he 
hath fallen into the hands of one, as he thinks, the 
most brave, valorous, and thrice- worthy signieur 
of England. 65 

Pist. As I suck blood, I will some mercy 
show. — 
Follow me. [Exit PISTOL. 

Boy. Suivez vous le grand capitaine. [Exit 
French Soldier.] I did never know so full a voice 
issue from so empty a heart : but the saying is 70 
true," The empty vessel makes the greatest sound." 
Bardolph and Nym had ten times more valor than 



loo KING HENR V V. [act iv. 

this roaring- devil i' the old play, that every one 
may pare his nails with a wooden dagger ; and 
75 they are both hanged ; and so would this be, if he 
durst steal anything adventurously. I must stay 
with the lackeys, with the luggage of our camp : 
the French might have a good prey of us, if he 
knew of it ; for there is none to guard it but boys. 

\Exif. 



SCENE Y.— Another Pari of the Field of Bailie. 

Alarums. Enler Dauphin, Orleans, Bour- 
bon, Constable, Rambures, a7id others. 

Con. O diable !. 

Orl. O seigneur ! — le jonr est perdu, tout 
est perdu ! 

Dau. Mori de via vie ! all is confounded, all. 
5 Reproach and everlasting shame 
Sits mocking in our plumes. — O incchante for- 
tune ! 
Do not run away. \A short alarum. 

Con. Why, all our ranks are broke. 

Dau. O perdurable shame !— let's stab our- 
selves. 
loBe these the wretches that we play'd at dice for ? 
Orl. Is this the king we sent to for his ransom ? 
Bour. Shame and eternal shame, nothing but 
shame ! 
Let's die in honor : once more back again ; 
And he that will not follow Bourbon now, 
15 Let him go hence. 

Con. Disorder, that hath spoil'd us, friend us 
now ! 



sc. VI.] KING HENRY V. loi 

Let us on heaps go offer up our lives. 

Orl. We are enow yet living in the field 
To smother up the English in our throngs, 
If any order might be thought upon. 20 

Bour. The devil take order now ! I'll to the 
throng ; 
Let life be short ; else shame will be too long. 

\Exetint. 

SCENE N\.— Another Part of the Field. 

Alarmus. Enter King Henry and Forces ; 
Exeter, and others, with Prisoners. 

K. Hen. Well have we done, thrice- valiant 
countrymen : 
But all's not done, yet keep the French the field. 

Exe. The Duke of York commends him to 
your majesty. 

K. Hen. Lives he, good uncle ? thrice within 
this hour 
I saw him down ; thrice up again and fighting ; 5 
From helmet to the spur all blood he was. 

Exe. In which array, brave ^oldier, doth he 
lie 
Larding the plain : and by his bloody side. 
Yoke- fellow to his honor-owing wounds, 
The noble Earl of Suffolk also lies. 10 

Suffolk first died : and York, all haggled over, 
Comes to him, where in gore he lay insteep'd, 
And takes him by the beard, kisses the gashes, 
That bloodily did yawn upon his face. 
And cries aloud, "Tarry, dear cousin Suffolk ! 15 
My soul shall thine keep company to heaven ; 



I02 KING HENRY V. [act iv. 

Tarry, sweet soul, for mine, then fly a-breast. 
As in this glorious and well-foughten tield 
We kept together in our chivalry 1 " 

20 Upon these words I came, and cheer'd him up : 
He smil'd me in the face, raught me his hand, 
And with a feeble gripe, says, " Dear my lord, 
Commend my service to my sovereign." 
So did he turn, and over Suffolk's neck 

25 He threw his wounded arm and kiss'd his lips ; 
And so, espous'd to death, with blood he seal'd 
A testament of noble-ending love. 
The pretty and sweet manner of it forc'd 
Those waters from me which I would have 
stopp'd ; 

30 But I had not so much of man in me. 
And all my mother came into mine eyes 
And gave me up to tears. 

K. Hen. I blame you not ; 

For, hearing this, I must perforce compound 

35 With mistful eyes, or they will issue too. — 

yAlariim. 
But, hark ! what new alarum is this same ? — 
The French have reinforc'd their scatter'd men : — 
Then every soldier kill his prisoners ; 
Give the word through. \Exeunt. 

SCENE N\\.— Another Part of the Field. 

Alarums. Enter Fluellen and Gower. 

Flu. Kill the poys and the luggage ! 'tis ex- 
pressly against the law of arms : 'tis as arrant a 
piece of knavery, mark you now, as can be offer't. 
In your conscience now, is it not ? 



sc. VII.] KING HENRY V. 103 

Gow. 'Tis certain there's not a boy left alive ; 5 
and the cowardly rascals that ran from the battle 
ha' done this slaughter : besides, they have 
burned and carried away all that was in the king's 
tent ; wherefore the king, most worthily, hath 
caused every soldier to cut his prisoner's throat. 10 
O, 'tis a gallant king ! 

Flu. Ay, he was porn at Monmouth , Cap- 
tain Gower. What call you the town's name 
where Alexander the Pig was porn ? 

Gow. Alexander the Great. . 13 

Flu. Why, I pray you, is not pig great ? Thq , 
pig or the great or the mighty or the huge or the," 
magnanimous are all one reckonings, save the 
phrase is a little variations. 

Gow. I think Alexander the Great was born 20 
in Macedon ; his father was called Philip of Mac- 
edon, as I take it. 

Flu. I think it is in Macedon where Alexander 
is porn. I tell you, captain, if you look in the 
maps of the 'orld, I warrant you sail find, in the 25 
comparisons between Macedon and Monmouth, 
that the situations, look you, is both alike. There 
is a river in Macedon ; and there is also moreover 
a river at Monmouth : it is called Wye at Mon- 
mouth ; but it is out of my prains what is the 30 
name of the other river ; but 'tis all one, 'tis alike 
as my fingers is to my fingers, and there is sal- 
mons in both. If you mark Alexander's life well, 
Harry of Monmouth's life is come after it indiffer- 
ent well ; for there is figures in all things. Alex- 35 
ander, Got knows, and you know, in his rages and 
his furies and his wraths and his cholers and his 
moods and his displeasures and his indignations 



I04 KING HENR V V. [act iv. 

and also being a little intoxicates in his prains 
40 did, in his ales and his angers, look you, kill his 
pest friend, Cleitus, 

Gow. Our king is not like him in that ; he 
never killed any of his friends. 

Flu. It is not well done, mark you now, to 
45 take the tales out of my mouth, ere it is made and 
finished. I speak but in the figures and com- 
parisons of it : as Alexander killed his friend 
Cleitus, being in his ales and his cups ; so also 
Harry Monmouth, being in his right wits and his 
50 goot judgments, turned away the fat knight with 
the great pelly-doublet : he was full of jests and 
gipes and knaveries and mocks ; I have forgot his 
name. 

Gow. Sir John Falstaff. 
55 Flu. That is he : I'll tell you there is goot men 
porn at Monmouth. 

Goiv. Here comes his majesty. 

Alarum. Enter King Henry with a part of 
the Etiglish Forces j Warwick, Gloster, 
Exeter, and others. 

K. Hen. I was not angry since I came to 
France 
Until this instant. Take a trumpet, herald ; 

60 Ride thou unto the horsemen on yon hill : 

If they will fight with us, bid them come down. 
Or void the field ; they do offend our sight : 
If they'll do neither, we will come to them, 
And make them skirr away, as swift as stones 

65 Enforced from the old Assyrian slings : 

Besides, we'll cut the throats of those we have, 



sc. VII.] KING HENR Y V. 105 

And not a man of them that we shall take 
Shall taste our mercy : go and tell them so. 

£xe. Here comes the herald of the French, 
my liege. 

G/o. His eyes are humbler than they us'd to be. 70 

JEn^er MONTJOY. 

/C. Hen. How now ! what means this, herald ? 
know'st thou not 
That I have fin'd these bones of mine for ransom ? 
Com'st thou again for ransom ? 

Mont. No, great king, 

I come to thee for charitable license, 'j^ 

That we may wander o'er this bloody field. 
To book our dead and then to bury them ; 
To sort our nobles from our common men. 
For many of our princes — woe the while ! — 
Lie drown'd and soak'd in mercenary blood ; 80 

So do our vulgar drench their peasant limbs 
In blood of princes ; and their wounded steeds 
Fret fetlock deep in gore, and with wild rage 
Yerk out their armed heels at their dead masters, 
Killing them twice. O, give us leave, great king, 85 
To view the field in safety, and dispose 
Of their dead bodies ! 

K. Hen. I tell thee truly, herald, 

I know not if the day be ours or no ; 
For yet a many of your horsemen peer 90 

And gallop o'er the field. 

Mont. The day is yours. 

K. Hen. Praised be God, and not our 
strength, for it ! 
What is this castle call'd that stands hard by ? 

Mont. They call it Agincourt. 95 



io6 KING HENRY V. [act iv. 

K. Heii. Then call we this the field of Agin- 
court, 
Fought on the day of Crispin Crispianus. 

Flu. Your grandfather of famous memory, 

an't please your majesty, and your great-uncle 

I GO Edward the Plack Prince of Wales, as I have read 

in the chronicles, fought a most prave pattle here 

in France. 

K. Hen. They did, Fluellen. 

Flu. Your majesty says very true : if your 

105 majesties is remembered of it, the Welshmen did 

goot service in a garden where leeks did grow, 

wearing leeks in their Monmouth caps ; which, 

your majesty know, to this hour is an honorable 

padge of the service ; and I do believe your maj- 

iioesty takes no scorn to wear the leek upon Saint 

Tavy's day. 

K. Hen. I wear it for a memorable honor ; 
For I am Welsh, you knov/, good countryman. 
Flu. All the water in Wye cannot wash your 
115 majesty's Welsh plood out of your pody, I can tell 
you that : Got pless it and preserve it, as long as 
it pleases his grace, and his majesty too ! 
K. Hen. Thanks, good my countryman. 
Flu. I am your majesty's countryman, I care 
120 not who know it ; I will confess it to all the 'orld : 
I need not be ashamed of your majesty, praised be 
Got, so long as your majesty is an honest man. 
K. He 71. God keep me so ! — Our heralds go 
with him ; 
Bring me just notice of the numbers dead 
125 On both our parts. Call yonder fellow hither. 

{Points to Williams. Exeunt Montjoy 

a7td others. 



sc. VII.] KING HENRY V. 107 

Exe. Soldier, you must come to the king. 

K. Hen. S-oldier, why wearest thou that glove 
in thy cap ? 

Will. An't please your majesty, 'tis the gage 
of one that I should hght withal, if he be alive. 130 

K. Hen. An Einghshman ? 
Will. An't please your majesty, a rascal that 
swaggered with me last night ; who, if 'alive, and 
ever dare to challenge this glove, I have sworn to 
take him a box o' the ear : or, if I can see my 135 
glove in his cap, which he swore, as he was a 
soldier, he would wear if alive, 1 will strike it out 
soundly. 

K. Hen. What think you. Captain Fluellen ? 
is it fit this soldier keep his oath ? 140 

Flu. He is a craven and a villain else, an't 
please your majesty, in my conscience. 

K. Hen. It may be his enemy is a gentleman 
of great sort, quite from the answer of his degree. 

Fhi. Though he be as goot a gentleman as 145 
the tevil is, as Lucifer and Belzebub himself, it is 
necessary, look your grace, that he keep his vow 
and his oath : if he be perjured, see you now, his 
reputation is as arrant a villain, and a Jack-sauce, 
as ever his plack shoe trod upon Got's ground 150 
and his earth, in my conscience, la. 

K. Hen. Then keep thy vow, sirrah, when thou 
meetest the fellow. 

Will. So I will, my liege, as I live. 

K. Heft. Who servest thou under? 155 

Will. Under Captain Gower, my liege. 

Flu. Gower is a goot captain ; and is goot 
knowledge and literatured in the wars. 

K. Hen. Call him hither to me, soldier. 



io8 KING HENRY V. [act iv. 

1 60 Will. I will, my liege. \Exit. 

K. Hen. Here, Fluellen ; wear thou this favor 
for me, and stick it in thy cap. When Alen^on 
and myself were down together, I plucked this 
glove from his helm : if any man challenge this, 
165 he is a friend to Alencon and an enemy to our 
person ; if thou encounter any such, apprehend 
him, an thou dost me love. 

Flu. Your grace does me as great honors as 
can be desired in the hearts of his subjects : I 
1 70 would fain see the man, that has but two legs, 
that shall find himself aggriefed at this glove, that 
is all ; but I would fain see it once, an please Got 
of his grace that I might see it. 
K. Heft. Knowest thou Gower ? 
175 Flu. He is my dear friend, an please you. 

K. Hen. Pray thee, go seek him, and bring 
him to my tent. 

Flu. I will fetch him. [Exit. 

K, Hen. My Lord of Warwick, and my brother 
Gloster, 
180 Follow Fluellen closely at the heels : 

The glove which I have given him for a favor 
May haply purchase him a box o* the ear ; 
It is the soldier's ; I by bargain should 
Wear it myself Follow, good cousin Warwick : 
185 If that the soldier strike him, as I judge 
By his blunt bearing he will keep his word. 
Some sudden mischief may arise of it ; 
For I do know Fluellen valiant, 
And, touch'd with choler, hot as gunpowder, 
190 And quickly v^ill return an injury: 

Follow, and see there be no harm between them. 
Go you with me, uncle of Exeter. {^Exeunt. 



sc. VIII.] KING HENR V V. 109 

SCENE Ylll.—B£'fore King Henry's Pavilion. 

Enter Gower and Williams. 

Will. I warrant it is to knight you, captain. 

Enter Fluellen. 

Flu. Captain, I peseech you now, come apace 
to the king : there is more goot toward you, per- 
adventure, than is in your knowledge to dream 
of. 

Will. Sir, know you this glove ? 

Flu. Know the glove ? I know the glove is a 
glove. 

Will. I know this, and thus I challenge it. 

\Strikes hivi. 

Flu. 'Splood, an arrant traitor as any's in the 
universal 'orld or in France or in England. 

Gow. How now, sir, you villain ! 

Will. Do you think I'll be forsworn ? 

Flu. Stand away. Captain Gower ; I will give 
treason his payment into plows, I warrant you. 

Will. I am no traitor. 

Flic. That's a lie in thy throat. I charge you 
in his majesty's name, apprehend him ; he's a 
friend of the Duke Alencon's. 

Enter Warwick and Gloster. 

War. How now, how now ! what's the matter ? 

Flu. My Lord of Warwick, here is a most 20 
contagious treason come to light, look you, — 
Praised be Got for it ! — as you shall desire in a 
summer's day. Here is his majesty. 



15 



no KING HENRY V. Lact iv. 

Enter King Henry and Exeter. 

K. Hen. How now ! what's the matter ? 

25 Fill. My liege, here is a villain and a traitor 

that, look your grace, has struck the glove which 

your majesty is take out of the helmet of Alen^on. 

Will. My liege, this was my glove ; here is the 

fellow of it ; and he that I gave it to in change 

30 promised to wear it in his cap ; I promised to 

strike him, if he did : I met this man with my 

glove in his cap, and I have been as good as my 

word. 

Fill. Your majesty hear now, saving your 
35 majesty's manhood, what an arrant, rascally, beg- 
garly knave it is : I hope your majesty is pear me 
testimony and witness, and will avouchment, that 
this is the glove of Alenc;on, that your majesty is 
give me, in your conscience, now. 
40 K. Hen. Give me thy glove, soldier ! Look, 
here's the fellow of it. 

'Twas I, indeed, thou promisedst to strike ; 
And thou hast given me most bitter terms. 

Flu. An please your majesty, let his neck 
45 answer for it, if there is any martial law in the 
'orld. 

K. Hen. How canst thou make me satisfac- 
tion? 

Will. All offences, my lord, come from the 

50 heart : never came any from mine that might 

offend your majesty. 

K. Hen. It was ourself thou didst abuse. 

Will. Your majesty came not like yourself : 

you appeared to me but as a common man : wit- 

55 ness the night, your garments, your lowliness ; 



sc. VIII.] KING HENRY V. iii 

and what your highness suffered under- that shape, 
I beseech you take it for your own fault and not 
mine : for, had you been as I took you for, I 
made no offence ; therefore, I beseech your high- 
ness, pardon me. 60 

K. Hejt. Here, uncle Exeter, fill this glove with 
crowns, 
And give it to this fellow. Keep it, fellow ; 
And wear it for an honor in thy cap 
Till I do challenge it. — Give him the crowns : — 
And, captain, you must needs be friends with 

him. 65 

Flu. By this day and this light, the fellow has 
mettle enough in his pelly. — Hold, there is tw^elve 
pence for you, and I pray you to serve Got, and 
keep you out of prawls and prabbles and quarrels 
and dissensions, and, I warrant you, it is the petter 70 
for you. 

Will. I will none of your money. 

Flu. It is with a goot will ; I can tell you it 
will serve you to mend your shoes. Come, where- 
fore should you be so pashful ? your shoes is not 75 
so goot : 'tis a good silling, I warrant you, or I 
will change it. 

Enter an English Herald. 

K. Hen. Now, herald, are the dead number'd ? 
Her. Here is the number of the slaughter'd 
French. [Delivers a paper. 

K. Hen. What prisoners of good sort are taken, 
uncle ? 80 

Exe. Charles Duke of Orleans, nephew to the 
king; 
John Duke of Bourbon, and Lord Bouciqualt : 



112 KING HENRY V. [act iv. 

Of other lords and barons, knights and squires, 
Full fifteen hundred, besides common men. 
85 K. Hen. This note doth tell me of ten thousand 
French 
That in the field lie slain : of princes in this 

number, 
And nobles bearing- banners, there lie dead 
One hundred twenty-six : added to these. 
Of knights, esquires, and gallant gentlemen, 
90 Eight thousand and four hundred ; of the which, 
Five hundred were but yesterday dubb'd knights; 
So that, in these ten thousand they have lost. 
There are but sixteen hundred mercenaries ; 
The rest are princes, barons, lords, knights, 
squires, 
95 And gentlemen of blood and quality. 

The names of those their nobles that lie dead — 
Charles Delabreth, high constable of France ; 
Jaques of Chatillon, admiral of France ; 
The master of the cross-bows, Lord Rambures ; 
100 Great master of France, the brave Sir Guichard 
Dauphin ; 
John Duke of Alen^on ; Anthony Duke of Brab- 
ant, 
The brother to the Duke of Burgundy ; 
And Edward Duke of Bar : of lusty earls, 
Grandpre and Roussi, Fauconberg and Foix, 
105 Beaumont and Marie, Vaudemont and Lestrale. — 
Here was a royal fellowship of death ! 
Where is the number of our English dead ? 

[Herald presents another paper, 
Edward the Duke of York, the Earl of Suffolk, 
Sir Richard Ketly, Davy Gam, esquire : 
1 10 None else of name ; and, of all other men, 



PROLOGUE.] KING HENRY V. 1T3 

But fiv^e-and-twenty. O God, thy arm was here, 

And not to us, but to thy arm alone, 

Ascribe we all ! — When, without stratagem, 

But in plain shock and even play of battle, 

Was ever known so great and little loss, 115 

On one part and on the other ? — Take it, God, 

For it is none but thine ! 

£xe. 'Tis wonderful ! 

K. Hen. Come, go we in procession to the 
village : 
And be it death proclaimed through our host 120 

To boast of this or take that praise from God 
Which is his only. 

Flu. Is it not lawful, an please your majesty, 
to tell how many is killed ? 

K. Hen. Yes, captain ; but with this acknowl- 125 
edgment — 
That God fought for us. 

Flu. Yes, my conscience. 

K. Hen. Do we all holy rites ; 
Let there be sung Non Nobis and Te Dejim; 130 

The dead with charity enclos'd in clay : 
And then to Calais ; and to England then, 
Where ne'er from France arriv'd more happy 
men. [^Exeu7i'f. 



ACT V. 

Prologue. 

Enter CHORUS. 

Chor. Vouchsafe to those that have not read 
the story, 
That I may prompt them : and of such as have. 



114 KING HENRY V. [act v. 

I humbly pray them to admit the excuse 
Of time, of numbers, and due course of things, 
5 Which cannot in their huge and proper Hfe 
Be here presented. Now we bear the king 
Toward Calais : grant him there ; there seen, 
Heave him away upon your winged thoughts 
Athwart the sea. Behold the English beach 

lo Pales in the tiood with men, w^ith wives, and bo|-s, 
Whose shouts and claps out-voice the deep- 

mouth'd sea, 
Which, like a mighty whiffler 'fore the king. 
Seems to prepare his way : so let him land, 
And solemnly see him set on to London. 

15 So swift a pace hath thought that even now 
You may imagine him upon Blackheath : 
Where that his lords desire him to have borne 
His bruised helmet and his bended sword 
Before him through the city ; he forbids it, 

20 Being free from vainness and self-glorious pride ^ 
Giving full trophy, signal and ostent. 
Quite from himself to God. But now behold, 
In the quick forge and working-house of thought, 
How London doth pour out her citizens ! 

25 The mayor and all his brethren in best sort, 
Like to the senators of the antique Rome, 
With the plebeians swarming at their heels, 
Go forth and fetch their conquering Caesar in : 
As, by a lower but loving likelihood, 

30 Were now the general of our gracious empress. 
As in good time he may, from Ireland coming, 
Bringing rebellion broached on his sword, 
How many would the peaceful city quit 
To welcome him ! much more, and much more 
cause. 



SCI.] KING HENRY V. 115 

Did they this Harry. Now in London place him ; 35 

As yet the lamentation of the French 

Invites the King of England's stay at home : 

The emperor's coming in behalf of France 

To order peace between them ; and omit 

All the occurrences, whatever chanc'd, 40 

Till Harry's back-return again to France : 

There must we bring him ; and myself have 

play'd 
The interim by remembering you 'tis past. 
Then brook abridgment ; and your eyes advance, 
After your thoughts, straight back again to 

France. \Exif, 45 

SCENE I. — France. An English Conrf of Guard. 
Enter Fluellex and Gower. 

Goiv. Nay, that's right ; but why wear you 
your leek to-day ? Saint Davy's day is past. 

Flu. There is occasions and causes why and 
wherefore in all things ; I will tell you, asse my 
friend, Captain Gower. The rascally, scald, beg- 5 
garly, pragging knave. Pistol, which you and 
yourself and all the 'orld know to be no petter 
than a fellow, look you now, of no merits, — he is 
come to me and prings me pread and salt yester- 
day, look you, and bid me eat my leek : it was in 10 
a place w^here I could not breed no contention 
with him ; but I will be so pold as to wear it in 
my cap till I see him once again, and then I will 
tell him a little piece of my desires. 

Gow. Why, here he comes, swelling like a 1 5 
turkey-cock. 



ii6 KING HENR Y V. [act v. 

F/h. 'Tis no matter tor his swellings nor his 
turkey-cocks. 

Enter Pistol. 

Got pless you, Auncient Pistol ! you scurvy, lousy 
20 knave. Got pless you ! 

Pist. Ha! art thou bedlam ? dost thou thirst, 
base Trojan, 

To have me fold up Parca's fatal web ? 
Hence ! I am qualmish at the smell of leek. 
25 Flu. I peseech you heartily, scurvy, lousy 
knave, at my desires and my requests and my pe- 
titions, to eat, look you, this leek ; because, look 
you, you do not love it, nor your affections and 
your appetites and your digestions does not agree 
30 with it, I would desire you to eat it. 

Plst. Not for Cadwallader and all his goats. 
Flu. There is one goat for you. Y^irikes 
him.'] Will you be so goot, scald knave, as eat it ? 
Plst. Base Trojan, thou shalt die. 
^5 Flu. You say very true, scald knave, when 
Got's will is : I will desire you to live in the mean 
time, and eat your victuals ; come, there is sauce 
for it. l^Strikhtg- him again.'] You called me 
yesterday mountain-squire, but I will make you 
40 to-day a squire of low degree. I pray you, fall to ; 
if you can mock a leek, you can eat a leek. 

Gow. Enough, captain ; you have astonished 
him. 

Flu. I say I will make him eat some part of 
45 iTiy leek, or I will peat his pate four days. — Pite, I 
pray you ; it is goot for your green wound and 
your ploody coxcomb. 
Pist. Must I bite ? 



SCI.] KIXG HENRY V. ny 

Flu. Yes, certainly, and out of doubt and out 
of questions too and ambiguities. 50 

Pist. By this leek, I will most horribly revenge ; 
I eat and eat, I swear — 

Flu. Eat, I pray you. Will you have some 
more sauce to your leek ? there is not enough 
leek to swear by. 55 

Pist. Quiet thy cudgel ; thou dost see I eat. 

Flu. Much goot to you, scald knave, heartily. 
Nay, pray you, throw none away ; the skin is goot 
for your proken coxcomb. When you take occa- 
sions to see leeks hereafter, I pray you, mock at 60 
'em ; that is all. 

Pist. Good. 

Flu. Ay, leeks is goot. — Hold you, there is a 
groat to heal your pate. 

Pist. Me a groat ! 65 

Flu. Yes, verily and in truth, you shall take it ; 
or I have another leek in my pocket, which you 
shall eat. 

Pist. I take thy groat in earnest of revenge. 

Flu. If I owe you anything, I will pay you in 70 
cudgels ; you shall be a woodmonger, and buy 
nothing of me but cudgels. God be wi' you and 
keep you and heal your pate. \Exit. 

Pist. All hell shall stir for this. 

Gow. Go, go ; you are a counterfeit cowardly 75 
knave. Will you mock at an ancient tradition- — 
begun upon an honorable respect, and worn as 
a memorable trophy of predeceased valor — and 
dare not avouch in your deeds any of your words ? 
1 have seen you gleeking and galling at this 80 
gentleman twice or thrice. You thought, because 
he could not speak English in the native garb, he 



ii8 KING HENRY V. [act v. 

could not therefore handle an English cudgel : you 
find it otherwise ; and henceforth let a Welsh 

85 correction teach you a good English condition. 
Fare ye well. \Exit. 

Pist. Doth Fortune play the huswife with me 
now ? 
News have I that my Nell is dead i' the spital ; 
And there my rendezvous is quite cut off. 

90 Old I do wax ; and from my weary limbs 
Honor is cudgell'd. Well, pimp will I turn, 
And something lean to cutpurse of quick hand. 
To England will' I steal, and there I'll steal : 
And patches will I get unto these scars, 

95 And swear I got them in the GaUia wars. 

\Exit. 

SCENE II. — Troy es, in Chajtipagne. An Apart- 
ment in the French King's Palace. 

Enter from one side, King Henry, Bedford, 
Gloster, Exeter, Warwick, Westmore- 
land, and other Lords ; from the other side, 
the French King, Queen Isabel, the Princess 
Katharine, Lords, Ladies, etc.,. the Duke of 
Burgundy, and his Train. 

K. Hen. Peace to this meeting, wherefore we 
are met ! 
Unto our brother France, and to our sister. 
Health and fair time of day ; joy and good wishes 
To our most fair and princely cousin Katharine ; 
5 And, as a branch and member of this royalty, 
By whom this great assembly is contriv'd, 
We do salute you, Duke of Burgundy ; 
And, princes French, and peers, health to you all ! 



sen.] KING HENRY V. 119 

Fr. King. Right joyous are we to behold your 
face, 
Most worthy brother England ; fairly met : 10 

So are you, princes English, every one. 

Q. ha. So happy be the issue, brother Eng- 
land, 
Of this good day and of this gracious meeting 
As we are now glad to behold your eyes ; 
Your eyes, which hitherto hath borne in them 15 
Against the French, that met them in their bent, 
The fatal balls of murdering basilisks : 
The venom of such looks, we fairly hope. 
Have lost their quality ; and that this day 
Shall change all griefs and quarrels into love. 20 
K. Hen. To cry amen to that thus we appear. 
Q. ha. You English princes all, I do salute you. 
Bur. My duty to you both, on equal love. 
Great Kings of France and England ! That I have 

labor'd 
With all my wits, my pains, and strong endeavors 25 
To bring your most imperial majesties 
Unto this bar and royal interview 
Your mightiness on both parts best can witness. 
Since then my office hath so far prevail'd 
That face to face, and royal eye to eye, 30 

You have congreeted, let it not disgrace me, 
If I demand, before this royal view, 
What rub or what impediment there is, 
Why that the naked, poor, and mangled Peace, 
Dear nurse of arts, plenties, and joyful births, yj 
Should not, in this best garden of the world. 
Our fertile France, put up her lovely visage ? 
Alas, she hath from France too long been chas'd ! 
And all her husbandry doth lie on heaps, 



120 KING HENRY V. [act v. 

40 Corrupting in it own fertility. 

Her vine, the merry cheerer of the heart, 
Unpruned dies : her hedges even-pleach'd, 
Like prisoners wildly overgrown with hair, 
Put forth disorder'd twigs ; her fallow leas 

45 The darnel, hemlock, and rank fumitory 
Doth root upon ; while that the coulter rusts 
That should deracinate such savagery : 
The even mead, that erst brought sweetly forth 
The freckled cowslip, burnet, and green clover, 

50 Wanting the scythe, all uncorrected, rank, 
Conceives by idleness ; and nothing teems 
But hateful docks, rough thistles, kecksies, burs. 
Losing both beauty and utility : 
And as our vineyards, fallows, meads, and hedges, 

55 Defective in their natures, grow to wildness. 
Even so our houses and ourselves and children 
Have lost or do not learn, for want of time, 
The sciences that should become our country ; 
But grow like savages — as soldiers will 

60 That nothing do but meditate on blood — 
To swearing and stern looks, dififus'd attire, 
And everything that seems unnatural. 
Which to reduce into our former favor 
You are assembled ; and my speech entreats 

65 That I may know the let, why gentle Peace 
Should not expel these inconveniences. 
And bless us with her former qualities. 

K. Hen. If, Duke of Burgundy, you would the 
peace, 
Whose want gives growth to 'the imperfections 

70 Which you have cited, you must buy that peace 
With full accord to all our just demands ; 
Whose tenors and particular effects 



sen.] KING HENRY V. 121 

You have, enschedul'd briefly, in your hands. 

Bur. The king hath heard them ; to the which, 
as yet, 
There is no answer made. 75 

K. Hen. Well then, the peace, 

Which you before so urg'd, lies in his answer. 

Fr. King. I have but with a cursorary eye 
O'er-glanc'd the articles : pleaseth your grace 
To appoint some of your council presently 80 

To sit with us once more, with better heed 
To re-survey them, we will suddenly 
Pass our accept and peremptory answer. 

K. Hen. Brother, we shall. Go, uncle Exeter, 
And brother Clarence, and you, brother Gloster, 85 
Warwick, and Huntington, — go with the king : 
And take with you free power to ratify. 
Augment, or alter, as your wisdoms best 
Shall see advantageable for our dignity, 
Anything in or out of our demands, 90 

And we'll consign thereto. Will you, fair sister, 
Go with the princes or stay here with us ? 

Q. ha. Our gracious brother, I will go with 
them ; 
Haply a woman's voice may do some good, 
When articles too nicely urg'd be stood on. 95 

K. Hen. Yet leave our cousin Katharine here 
with us ; 
She is our capital demand, compris'd. 
Within the fore rank of our articles. 

Q. Is a. She hath good leave. 

Exeunt all but Henry, Katharine, and her 
Gentlewoman. 

K. Hen. Fair Katharine, and most fair ! 100 



122 KING HENRY V. [act v. 

Will you vouchsafe to teach a soldier terms 
Such as will enter at a lady's ear 
And plead his love-suit to her gentle heart ? 
Kath. Your majesty shall mock at me ; I cannot 
105 speak your England, 

K. Hen. O fair Katharine, if you will love me 
soundly with your French heart, I will be glad to 
hear you confess it brokenly with your English 
tongue. Do you like me, Kate ? 
1 10 Kath. Pardonnez jnoi, I cannot tell vat is like 
me. 
K. Hen. An angel is like you, Kate, and you 
are like an angel. 

Kath. Qiie dlt-il? que je suis semblable a 
les anges ? 
115 Alice. Oui,vraiuient, saufvotre grace, ainsi 
dit-il. 

K. Hen. I said so, dear Katharine, and I must 
not blush to affirm it. 

Kath. O bon Dieu ! les langues des homines 
I2osont pleines des tromperies. 

K. Hen. What says she, fair one ? that the 
tongues of men are full of deceits ? 

Alice. Oui ; dat the tongues of de mans is be 
full of deceits : dat is de princess. 
125 K. Hen. The princess is the better English- 
woman, r faith, Kate, my wooing is fit for thy 
understanding : I am glad thou canst speak no 
better English ; for, if thou couldst, thou wouldst 
find me such a plain king that thou wouldst 
1 30 think I had sold my farm to buy my crown. I 
know no ways to mince it in love, but directly to 
say, "I love you: "then, if you urge me further 
than to say, " Do you \\\ faith ? " I wear out my 



sc. II.] KING HENR V V. 123 

suit. Give me your answer: i' faith, do ; and so 
clap hands and a bargain : how say you, lady ! 135 

Kath. Sauf votre hojitieur, me understand 
well. 

K. Hen, Marry, if you would put me to verses 
or to dance for your sake, Kate, why you undid 
me : for the one, I have neither words nor meas- 140 
ure ; and for the other, I have no strength in 
measure, yet a reasonable measure in strength. 
If I could win a lady at leap-frog, or by vaulting 
into my saddle with my armor on my back, under 
the correction of bragging be it spoken, I should 145 
quickly have a wife. Or, if I might buffet for my 
love, or bound my horse for her favors, I could lay 
on like a butcher and sit like a jack-an-apes, never 
off. But, Kate, I cannot look greenly, nor gasp 
out my eloquence, nor I have no cunning in pro- 150 
testation ; only downright oaths, which I never 
use till urged, nor never break for urging. If 
thou canst love a fellow of this temper, K^te, 
whose face is not worth sun-burning, that never 
looks in his glass for love of anything he sees there, 1 55 
let thine eye be thy cook. I speak to thee plain 
soldier : if thou canst love me for this, take me ; 
if not, to say to thee that I shall die is true: but 
for thy love, no ; yet I love thee too. And while 
thou livest, dear Kate, take a fellow of plain and 160 
uncoined constancy ; for he perforce must do thee 
right, because he hath not the gift to woo in other 
places : for these fellows of infinite tongue, that 
can rhyme themselves into ladies' favors, they do 
always reason themselves out again. What ! a 165 
speaker is but a prater ; a rhyme is but a ballad. 
A good leg v/ill fall ; a straight back will stoop ; 



124 KING HENR V V. [act v. 

a black beard will turn white ; a curled pate will 
grow bald ; a fair face will wither ; a full eye will 

170 wax hollow : but a good heart, Kate, is the sun 
and the moon ; or rather the sun and not the 
moon ; for it shines bright and never changes 
but keeps his course truly. If thou would have 
such a one, take me : and take me, take a soldier ; 

175 take a soldier, take a king. And what sayest thou 
then to my love ? speak, my fair, and fairly, I pray 
thee. 

Kath. Is it possible dat I sould love de enemy 
of France ? 

180 K. Hen. No, it is not possible you should love, 
the enemy of France, Kate ; but, in loving me, 
you should love the friend of France ; for I love 
France so well that I will not part with a village 
of it ; I will have it all mine : and, Kate, when 

.185 France is mine and I am yours, then yours is 
France and you are mine. 

Kath. I cannot tell vat is oat. 
K. Hen. No, Kate ? I will tell thee in French ; 
which I am sure will hang upon my tongue like 

190 a new-married wife about her husband's neck, 
hardly to be shook off. Quand j ai la possession 
de France, et quand vous avez la possessioji de 
vioi (let hie see, what then ? Saint Denis be my, 
speed !) — done voire est France, et vous etes . 

i(^^y?nienne. It is as easy for me, Kate, to conquer 
the kingdom as to speak so much more French : 
I shall never move thee in French, unless it be to 
laugh at me. 

Kath. Sauf votre honneur, le Frangais que 

200 vous parte z est meilleur que f Anglais lequel j'e 
parte. 



SC. II.] KI.^fG HENRY V. 125 

A". Hen. No, faith, is't not, Kate : but thy 
speaking of my tongue, and I thine, most truly- 
falsely, must needs be granted to be much at one. 
But, Kate, dost thou understand thus much Eng- 205 
lish — canst thou love me ? 

Kath. I cannot tell. 

K. Hen. Can any of your neighbours teil, Kate ? 
I'll ask them. Come, I know thou lovest me : 
and at night, when you come into your closet, 210 
you'll question this gentlewoman about me ; and 
I know, Kate, you will to her dispraise those parts 
in me that you love with your heart ; but, good 
Kate, mock me mercifully ; the rather, gentle 
princess, because I love thee cruelly. How an- 215 
swer you, la plus belle Katharine du nioiide, 
nion ires chere et divine deesse ? 

Kath. Your majeste 'siVQ/ausse French enough 
to deceive de most sage demoiselle dat is e?t 
France. 22a 

K. Hen. Now, fie upon my false French ! 
By mine honor, in true English, I love thee, Kate; 
by which honor, I dare not swear thou lovest me; 
yet my blood begins to flatter me that thou dost, 
notwithstanding the poor and untempering effect 225 
of my visage. I was ^ created with a stubborn 
outside, with an aspect of iron, that when I come 
to woo ladies I fright them. But, in faith, Kate, 
the elder I wax, the better I shall appear : my 
comfort is, that old age, that ill layer-up of beauty, 230 
can do no more spoil upon my face : thou hast 
me, if thou hast me, at the worst ; and thou shalt 
wear me, if thou wear me, better and better. 
And therefore tell me, most fair Katharine, will 
you have me ? Put off your maiden blushes ; 235 



. 126 KING HENRY V. [act v. 

avouch the thoughts of your heart with the looks 
of an empress ; take me by the hand, and say, 
" Harry of England, I am thine :" which word 
thou shalt no sooner bless mine ear withal, but I 
'240 will tell thee aloud, " England is thine, Ireland is 
thine, France is thine, and Henry Plantagenet is 
thine ;" who, though I speak it before his face, 
if he be not fellow with the best king, thou shalt 
find the best king of good fellows. Come, your 
245 answer in broken music ; for thy voice is music, 
and thy English broken : therefore, queen of all, 
Katharine, break thy mind to me in broken 
English, — wilt thou have me ? 

Kath, Dat is as it sail please de roi mon 
2'^opere. 

K. Hen. Nay, it will please him well, Kate ; it 
shall please him, Kate. 

Kath. Den it sail also content me. 

K. Hen. Upon that I kiss your hand, and I call 
255 you my queen. 

Kath. Laissen, vion seigneur, laissez, lais- 

sez ; ma foi, je ne veux point que vous 

abaissiez votre grandeur en baisant la main 

cTune votre indigiie scrviteure ; excusez moi., je 

2607/ous supplie, mon tres puissant seigneur. 

K. Hen. Then I will kiss your lips, Kate. 

Kath. Les dames et demoiselles pour etre 
baissees devant leur noces, il ?i'est pas la cou- 
tume de Fratice. 
265 K. Hen. Madam, my interpreter, what say:, 
she ? 

Alice. Dat it is not be de fashion pour les 
ladies of France — I cannot tell vat is baiser en 
English. 



sen.] KING HENRY V. 127 

K. Hen. To kiss. 270 

Alice. Your majesty entendre bettre q^le moi. 
K. Hen. It is not a fashion for the maids in 
France to kiss before they are married, would she 
say ? 

Alice. Oui, vraiment. 275 

K. Hen. O Kate, nice customs curtsy to great 
kings. Dear Kate, you and I cannot be confined 
within the weak Hst of a country' 's fashion : we 
are the makers of manners, Kate ; and the liberty 
that follows our places stops the mouths of all 280 
find- faults ; as I will do yours, for upholding the 
nice fashion of your country in denying me a kiss ; 
therefore, patiently and yielding. [Kissing Aer.] 
You have witchcraft in your lips, Kate ; there is 
more eloquence in a sugar touch of them than in 285 
the tongues of the French council ; and they 
should sooner persuade Harry of England than a 
general petition of monarchs. Here comes your 
father. 

Enter the French King «;?<■/ Queen, Burgundy, 
Bedford, Gloster, Exeter, Westmore- 
land, and other French and English Lords. 

Bur. God save your majesty I my royal cousin, 290 
teach you our princess English } 

K. Hen. I would have her learn, my fair 
cousin, how perfectly I love her : and that is good 
English. 

Bur. Is she not apt .'' 295 

K. Hen. Our tongue is rough, coz ; and my 
condition is not smooth : so that, having neither 
the voice nor the heart. of flattery about me, I can- 



128 KING HENRY V. [act v. 

not so conjure up the spirit of love in her that he 
300 will appear in his true likeness. Shall Kate be 
my wife ? 

Fr. King. So please you. We have consented 
to all ternis of reason. 

K. Hen. Is't so, my lords of England ? 
305 West. The king hath granted every article : 
His daughter, first ; and then in sequel all. 
According to their firm proposed natures. 

Exe. Only he hath not yet subscribed this : 
Where your majesty demands that the king of 
310 France, having any occasion to write for matter 
of grant, shall name your highness in this forni 
and with this addition, in French — Notre ires 
cher fits Hetiri, rot cVAngleterre, Heritier de 
France ; and thus in Latin — PrcE Claris sitnus 
^i^filius nosier Hcnricus, Rex Anglice, et Hcercs 
Francicp. 

Fr, King. Nor this I have not, brother, so de- 
nied 
But your request shall make me let it pass. 

K. Hen. I pray you then, in love and dear al- 
liance, 
320 Let that one article rank with the rest ; 
And thereupon give me your daughter. 

Fr. King. Take her, fair son, and from her 
blood raise up 
Issue to me ; that the contending kingdoms 
Of France and England, whose very shores look 
pale 
325 With envy of each other's happiness, 

May cease their hatred, and this dear conjunc- ' 

tion 
Plant neijrhbourhood and Christian-like accord 



EPILOGUE.] KING HENRY V. 129. 

In their sweet bosoms, that never war advance 
His bleeding sword 'twixt England and fair 
France. • 

AJL Amen ! 330 

K. Hen. Now, welcome, Kate ; and bear me 
witness all 
That here I kiss her as my sovereign queen. 

\Floiirish. 
Q. Isa. God, the best maker of all marriages, 
Combine your hearts in one, your realms in one ! 
As man and wife, being two, are one in love, ;^2)S 

So be there 'twixt your kingdoms such a spousal 
That never may ill office, or fell jealousy. 
Which troubles oft the bed of blessed marriage. 
Thrust in between the paction of these kingdoms 
To make divorce of their incorporate league ; 340 
That English may as French, French Englishmen, 
Receive each other ! — God speak this Amen ! 
A/L Amen ! 

K. Hen. Prepare we for our marriage ; on 
which day. 
My Lord of Burgundy, we'll take your oath, 345 

And all the peers', for surety of our leagues. 
Then shall I swear to Kate, and you to me ; 
And may our oaths well kept and prosperous be ! 

[Exeunt. 
Epilogue. 
Enter Chorus. 

Chor. Thus far, with rough and all-unable 

pen, 
Our bending author hath pursued the story : 
In little room confining mighty men, 

Manghng by starts the full course of their glory. 



.A 



130 KhXG HENRY V. [epilogue. 

5 Small time, but in that small most greatly lived 
This star of England : Fortune made his sword ; 

9 By which the world's best garden he achiev'd, 

And of it left his son imperial lord. 
Henry the Sixth, in infant bands crown'd King 

10 Of France and England, did this king succeed ; 
Whose state so many had the managing 

That they lost France and made his England 

bleed ; 
Which oft our stage hath shown ; and, for their 

sake. 
In your fair minds let this acceptance take. {Exit. 



NOTES. 



Abbreviations.— A. S. = Anglo-Saxon ; Cf. = confer (compare) ; .Cog. = 
cognate ; E. = English ; Fr. = French ; Gr. = Greek ; Lat. = Latin ; Lit. 
= Uterally ; M. E. = Middle English ; O. Br. =01d French ; pa. p. = past 
participle ; pr. p. = present participle ; C. Ed. = Collin's Edition ; CI. Pr. 
Ed. = Clarendon Press Edition ; L. S.= Longman Series ; R. Ed. = Rugby 
Ed. Notes without signature or quotation marks are from Chambers' edition. 

PROLOGUE. 

The Chorus explains the subject and the action of the play, and 
supplies a narrative of the events which are to be understood as 
occurring during- the intervals between the Acts. In the time of 
Shakespeare a chorus was the technical term for the prologue. 

1-2. A Muse, etc., an inspiring influence. Invention, im.- 

agination. In Shakespeare it has also these meanings : (i) A dis- 
covery or invention (the literal meaning) ; (2) a forgery or 
falsehood ; (3) thought, idea ; (4) the inventive or imaginative 
faculty. 

4. The swelling- scene, the increasing pomp and splendor of 
the scene. 

6. Mars, the Roman god of war. 

7. Lieash'd in like hounds, bound and led like hounds. 

8. Gentles, gentlefolks. 

9. Unrais^d, not elevated in thought. 

10. Scaffold, stage. O. Fr. esca/aut (Fr. echafaztd). The 
former part of the word is of Romance origin, and appears in 
Spanish cafar, to see— Lat. captare, and is thus cog. with E. catch; 
the latter part is seen in E. balcony^ and is from a Teutonic root. 

11. Object, representation, spectacle. Cockpit. The small 

compass of the theatre was better suited for a cock-fight than 
the representation of Henry's battles. 

13. This wooden O. The Globe Theatre, where this play was 
perhaps first acted, was in the form of an octagon. It was built 
in 1598 or 1599 t>y Burbage.— CI. Pr. Ed. 

16. Attest, represent, certify. 

17. Ciphers to this great accompt, who are as nothing m 

comparison with the characters who figured in the actual drama. 

Accompt, account. 

18. Imaginary forces, powers of imagination. 

. 19. Girdle, compass. K."^. gyrdel—gyrdan^ \.o^\r A -^ co^. \{\'Ca 
Ger. gtirtel. Allied words are gartk^ yard, and garden. 

131 



132 NOTES. [act I. 

21. Upreared and abutting- fronts, high and projecting 
shores. Abut, to border (on), to end. 

22. Narrow Ocean, the English Channel, called in French La 
Mancke, from its likeness to a sleeve.— C. Ed. 

25. Make imaginary puissance, imagine an armed force. 
Puissance is here a trisyllable. 

30. Turning the accomplishment, etc., representing in an 
hour what it took many years to accomplish. 

31. For the which supply, for supplying a narrative of 
the events. 

ACT FIRST. 
Scene i. 

1. Self =sel/'-same. L. S. 

2. The eleventh year, etc viz., in 1410, when a vigorous at- 
tempt to strip the church of part of its immense possessions was 
made by the Lollard party under its leader, Sir John Oldcastle, 
better known as Lord Cobham. 

3. Was like [to have passed], and had [would have] in- 
deed, etc. 

4- Scambling, scrambling, struggling. 
5. Question — consideration. 

14. Esquires, attendants on the knights, lit. "shield bearers." 
O. Fr. escuyer — Low Lat. scutarius — Lat. scutum^ a shield. 

15. Lazars, persons afflicted with loathsome disease, especially 
leprosy, like Lazarus in the parable. 

29-32. Consideration = reflection. 

34. A heady currancej a headlong current. 

36. Nor never. Negatives were repeated in early English for 

the sake of emphasis. Hydra-beaded. The Hydra that 

dwelt in a swamp near Lerna in Argos, had nine heads, and no 
sooner had Hercules knocked off one with his club than two new 
ones sprang up in its place. 

45. List is often in Shakespeare used transitively. 

47. Any cause of policy, any question of oolitics. 

48. The Gordian knot. Gordius, king of t'hrygia, was orig- 
inally a poor peasant. Being made king, he dedicated his chariot 
to Jupiter, in the acropolis of Gordium. An intricate knot of bark 
fastened the pole to the yoke, and an oracle declared that whoever 
should loose it would rule over the whole of Asia. Alexander the 
Great made short work of the difficulty by cutting the knot with 
his sword. 

49. Familiar. In Elizabethan English, adjectives are freely 
used as adverbs. That. So is here omitted. 

50. A charter'd libertine, having a right or charter to move 
at liberty. 

56. Addiction, inclination. 

57. Companies, for companions. 



sc. II.] NOTES. 133 

59. And never [was there] noted, etc. 

61. Popularity, association with the common people. 

65. Contemplation, studious disposition. 

68. Yet crescive in his faculty, yet showing its power of 
growth. His^ the old form of the genitive case of it. " Its " does 
not occur in Spenser, or the Bible of 161 1 (which has it where 
modern editions have its in Leviticus, xxv. 5), is found only thrice 
in Milton. Its first appeared in print in 1598. — Prof. Lounsbury. 

70. Nesds, a substantive adverb with the old inflection of the 
genitive singular ~es. 

75. Indifferent, impartial. 

78. Exhibiters, those who presented the bill. 

80. Upon, upon the authority of, in consequence of. Our 

spiritual convocation. The Convocation of the church used to 
pass ecclesiastical laws and grant subsidies tothe crown. It gradually 
fell into impotence, and was virtually suspended from 1717 to 1840. 

90. The severals and unhidden passagres, the details 
and clear documentary proofs. 

91. Sorae certain, a pleonasm. The dukedoms were Aquitaine, 
Anjou, Maine, and iNormandy. 

92. Seat, throne. 

99. Embassy, mission. 

Scene 2. 

5. Cousin in Shakespeare is used (i) to denote, besides the son 
or daughter of an uncle or aunt, any kmsman or kinswoman ; (2) 
as a title given by princes to other princes and distinguished noble- 
men. This last is the meaning here. 

12. Law Salique. The Salic (from the Bavarian river Saale) 
law originated in the custom of the Salian Franks, who finally 
settled in France under their leader Pharamond, about 418, " when 
the kingdom of France was founded." It was one of their laws 
that no woman could succeed to an inheritance, lest by marrying 
she should carry her property and power into another house. The 
law was first applied to French politics in the fourteenth centur>'. 
When the English kings laid a claim to the French throne through 
the female line, it became an article of French patriotism to main- 
tain the Salic law as a necessary safeguard of nationality. 

15. " Distort the knowledge gained by reading." 

17. Miscreate, falsely invented. 

2 0. In approbation, in proving or making good our claim." 

21. Your reverence, " reverence y^r you." 

22. Impawn, pledge or engage in. 
29. Mortality, human life. 

41: Grloze, to explain away, as by a gloss or comment. 
?o. Dishonest, unchaste. 

54. Meisen, Meissen, near Dresden, now famous for the manu- 
facture of china. 



134 NOTES. [act I. 

59. Defunction, death. 

60. Idly, unreasonably, carelessly. 

62, 75, 76.' Charles the Great . . . Charlemain . . The first 
is Charlemagne, the son of Pepin (690-741J : Charlemain is Charles 
the Bald (le Chauve) born 822, died 877. 

66. King Pepin, " the Short," son of Charles Martel, and the first 
kin^ of the Carlovingian dynasty, He deposed Childeric, the last 
of the Merovingians, in 751. and reigned till 768. 

68. Blithild, queen of France, daughter of Clothaire II., and 
"vvife of Childeric II. 

70. Hug-h Capet, Duke of France, who, after the death of Louis 
v., seized the throne, was crowned in 987, and reigned till his death 
in 996. 

71. Charles the Dnke of Lorraine, received from the Em- 
peror Otho II. the dukedom of Lower Lorraine, and attempted, on 
the Jdeath of Louis V., to seize the crown, but was worsted by 
Hugh Capet, and flung' into prison, where he died in 993. 

73. rind = provide. 

74. Naught, worthless, good for nothing. Naughty occurs in 
the Merchant of Venice in the sense of '* bad, wicked." 

75- Convey'd himself, managed to pass himself off. 

77. The arguments of the archbishop may be thus summed : (i) 
The Salic law is not, and never was, applicable to France. (2) 
Three sovereigns had already inherited the throne of France by 
right of female descent. 

89. King Lewis his satisfaction. '' His " frequently oc- 
curs in early English by mistake for '.r, the sign of the possessive 
case, especially alter a proper name ending in .r. The old inflec- 
tion of che genitive, -es^ seems to have been confounded with the 
pronoun " his." 

94. To hide them in a net, to take refuge in subtle in- 
tricacies. Them for "themselves," common in Elizabethan 

English. 

95- Irabar. " Bar in, secure," is Knight's intrepretation. 
Schmidt takes "■ imbar " as an intensive form of " bar," to ex- 
clude. 

99- Numbers, xxvii. i-n. "Writ and wrote both occur as 

the pa.p. in Shakespeare. 

107. Play'd a tragedy, the battle of Crecy (1346). 

113. With half their forces. One of the three divisions of 
the army (not the half) was held in reserve under the king, and 
took no part in the action. 

1 14- Another, the other. 

US- Cold for action, cool, ready for action.— C. Ed. 

T2I. The very May-morn of his youth. Henry was born 
in 1387, and was now in his 27th year. 

138. Proportions to defend, number of troops necessary for 
our defence. 



sc. n.] NOTES. 135 

139. Road, an incursion. 

140. Advantages, opportunities.— L. S. 

141. Marches, ttie border lands. 

144. Coursing- snatchers. The border freebooters were no- 
torious for cattle-lifting. 

145. Main intendment, chief aim or purpose. 

146. Still, always. 

Giddy, fickle, not to be trusted. 

152. The gleaned land, stripped of its defenders. Essays, 

attacks: also spelt " assays." 
156. Fear'd, frightened. 

161, Impounded as a stray, confined like a stray animal. 
Pounds an inclosure where strayed animals are shut up, from A.S. 
pyndan. to shut in. 

162. The king of Scots, David II., captured at the battle of 
Neville's Cross (1346) by the English army. 

168. In prey, in search of prey. 

174- A crush'd necessity, a forced inference.— C. Ed. 

177. Necessaries, provisions. 

178. Advised, wary, thoughtful. 
181. Congreeing, agreeing. 

188. Teach the act of order, show in a practical way what 
order is. 

190. Sorts, various ranks. 

192. Venture, to risk or speculate in trade. A cargo was 
termed a venture. 

194. Boot, plunder. It is merely a form of booty. 

196. Their emperor. Virgil in the Georgz'cs also represents the 
queen-bee as a male. 

197. Busied in his majesty, occupied with his kingly duties. 
203. Executors, executioners. 

206. Contrariously, from opposite points, by different ways. 
220. The name of hardiness, our reputation for bravery. 
226. Empery, empire. 

232. Like Turkish mute. To prevent the disclosure of cecrets 
it was a custom among the Turks to cut out the tongues of attend- 
ants at courts, of executioners, etc. 

233. Waxen epitaph, " not worshipped with an epitaph so 
perishable as one on wax.'' 

246. In fe^w, in short. 

253. Galliard, a lively dance. 

261-266. These lines are full of punning allusions to the game of 

tennis. Rackets, the handles with which the balls are struck. 

Play a set = to have a game at tennis. -Strike into, that 

is, unto the '' service" from the '■'hazard" side. Wrangler, 

an opponent. Courts. Tennis was played m walled courts, 

about 90 ft. long by 30 wide. Chaces, the ins and outs of 

tennis. 



(.\ 



136 NOTES. [actii. 

265. Shall strike, etc. The omission of the relative as the sub- 
ject is common in Shakespeare. Strike . . . into the haz- 
ard. " Hazard," hke " chaces," is a term of tennis-play, denot- 
ing the hole into which the ball was struck. 

271 . Seat, throne. 

275. State, chair of state. 

282. To look, in looking. 

284. Gun-stones. Cannon balls were at first made out of 
stone. 

309. Grod before, before God. 

■ ACT SECOND. 

Prologue. 

2. Silken dalliance, the robes suited to dalliance. 
6. Mirror, pattern. 

14. Pale policy, pale-hearted policy, cowardly scheming. 

18. Would thee do, would have thee do. 

19. Kind, true to the spirit of their race, not degenerate. A.S. 
cvndey natural — cynn^ a tribe. Kindly originally means " natural." 
Cf. " the kindly fruits of the earth." 

23. Richard, Earl of Cambride-e, cousin to Henry IV., and 
brother to the Duke of York in this play. 

24 Henry Lord Scroop of Mashani, the eldest son of Sir 
Stephen Scroop, who is one of the characters in Richard II. He 
had married the step-mother of the Earl of Cambridge. 

25. Sir Thomas G-rey of Heton, in Northumberland. 

26. Gilt, gold bribes. Guilt originally meant " a fine," or " a 
payment," by way of recompense for " an offence." A.S. gylt.a. 
crime ; connected with gyld, a recompense. Wergild (A.S. wer^ 
man, and g^ldan, to pay), among the Saxons, was the fine paid as 
compensation for murder. 

3i. Liingrer, a transitive verb. We'll digest, we will ar- 
range, dispose of. 

32. Abuse of distance. This refers to the deception by which 
the scene is in so short a time transferred from London to South- 
ampton. 

34. Set, set out. 

Scene i. 

3. Ancient, an ensign, standard-bearer, a corruption of O. Fr. 
enseigne — L. insignis., noted. 

10. There's an end to what I have to say. 
16. That is my rest, that is my resolve. 
30. Tike, cur. A Scandinavian word. 

34. Well-a-day, alas. It is another form of wella^vay. A.S. 
wd-id-wd, woe, lo ! woe. 



sc. II.] NOTES. 137 

36. Nothing, no violence. 

42. Shog: off, move off. Shog is perhaps another form of " jog," 
from a Celtic root. 

47. Maw, stomach. - — Perdy, a corruption of ¥r.J>ar Dieu. 

50. Take, take aim. Cock. Flint guns in use when the play- 
was written. —R. Ed. 

52. Barbason, the Jiame of a fiend, or demon ; also of an able 
officer in the service of the Dauphin. — C. Ed. 

60. Exhale, draw. It is used of the sun drawing up vapors, 
and thus producing meteors. 

64. Mickle, great ; an old form of " much." A.S. mycel^ great. 

65. Tall, valiant. 

69. Coupe le fforge, Pistol's French for "cut the throat." 

70. Hound of Crete. The bloodhounds of Crete were much 
prized in antiquity. 

97. Sword is an oath. The hilt, being in the form of a cross, 
was used to swear by. 

99. An, if. 

loi. Prithee, pray thee. 

104. A noble = 6s. 8d. 

116. Quotidian, a fever whose paroxysms return every day. 
A quotidian tertian is of course an absurdity. 

120. That's the even of it, that is the plain truth of the 
matter. 

124. Passes . . . careers, indulges in jokes and tricks. 

125. Lambkins, a term of endearment. Lavtb-k-in (with 
double diminutive suffix), from A.S. lamb. 

Scene 2. 

2. By and by, immediately. Cf. Luke xxi.g.— L.S. 

3. Even, composedly. 

9. Whom he hath duU'd, etc.. whom he hath surfeited with 
favors till he has lost all sense of gratitude. Cloy., to glut, satiate. 
18. Head, an armed force. 

33. The office of our hand, the use of our hand. 

34. Quittance, reward. 

40. Enlarge, set at large, liberate. 

43. On his more advice, on more carefully considering his 
case. 

44. Security has here the meaning of the Lat. secziritas^ the 
state of being without care. 

46. His sufferance, suffering of him, allowing him to go un- 
punished. 

52. Orisons, prayers. 

53-56. If little faults, etc. Arising in a distempered state of 
mind. — L. S. 

60. Late, lately appointed. 



A 



I3S NOTES. [act II. 

62. It, the written commission. 

79- duick, alive, living. Cf. " the quick and the dead," "cut to 
the quick." 

86. Apt, ready. Accord, agree. 

87. Appertinents, appurtenances, 

99. Use, advantage, interest. 

100. May, can. 

103. Gross, distinct. 

107. In a natural cause, a cause to which they were both 
akin, so there was nothing unnatural in what they did. — CI. Pr. Ed. 

111. Cunning, originally the pr.p. of M. E. cunnen., to know.— 
A.S. ctinnan^ to know. Fiend, from A.S. Jiond^/eond^ prp- of 

/eon, to hate. 

112. Preposterously, contrary to the natural order of things. . 
Lit. having that first which ought to be last. Lat. prceposterus— 

j>r(B, before, poster us ^ after. 
113- Instance, motive. 
T19. Jealousy, suspicion. 
121. Affiance, conhdence. 

127. Blood, used figuratively for " passion." 

128. Complement, corresponding outward appearance, the ex- 
ternal qualities that go to cotnplete the character. 

129. Not "workingr, etc., not trusting to appearances without 
enlightened judgment. 

131. Bolted, sifted, without mixture of vileness. 
153. In sufferance, in suffering the penalty. 
159. Quit, acquit, pardon. 

163. Earnest, money paid in token of a bargain made. 
169. Tender, regard. 

175. Dear offences, for which you will suffer dearly. 
182. Rub, that which causes friction, a hindrance. It is a term 
of the game of bowls. 

184. Puissance, forces, army. 

186. The sig-ns of war advance, bear forward the standards. 

Scene 3. 

Eastcheap. " from the A.S cedp^ price, cedpian, to buy. Cheap- 
side was one of the main thoroughfares of London." 

2. Staines, a small town on the road from London to South- 
ampton. 

3. Yearn, grieve. 

9. In Arthvir's bosom. The hostess means Abraham's 
bosom. 

10. 'A made, he made. For he we sometimes find in early 
English ha, 'a (not confined always to one number or gender) = 
Jie, she. it, they. A finer end, " a final end." 

11. Christom child, "■ like any newly baptised child." The 



sc. IV.] NOTES. 139 

chrisom was a white cloth put on a newly baptized child, and was 
worn by it for a time. During that time the infant was called a 
*' chrisom child." 

13. At the turning o' the tide. The belief is still common 
that a dying person will linger until the turn of the tide. 

30. Of, against. Rheumatic, she probably means lunatic. 

44. Chattels, properly any kind of property but freehold. A 
doublet of cattle. 

45. Let senses rule. Johnson proposed "let sense us rule." 

Pitch and. pay, a proverbial expression for -^ Pay ready 

money." 

48. Hold- fast is the only dog. The proverb is, '' Brag is a good 
dog, but hold-fast is a better." 
5J. Clear thy crystals, rub your glasses (of the hostel). 

Scene 4. 

1. Conies. The verb is singular, because by " the English" is 
to be understood the English king. 

2, More than caref aily, with more care than usual. 
10. Gulf, whirlpool. 

26. Morris dance, a Moorish dance, said to have been intro- 
duced into England from Spain about the time of Edward IV. 

27. Idly king'd, having a fool for a king, carelessly governed. 
36. In exception, in taking exception, in offering objections. 
39. The Roman Brutus. Lucius Junius Brutus, to escape the 

suspicion of his uncle, Tarquinius Superbus, feigned to be an 
idiot. 

48. "Which, . . . projection, which being planned on a weak 
and niggardly scale. 

49. fcjcautLng, giving hardly enough, limiting. 

53. Plesh'd upon us, trained or practiced upon us. 

53. Strain, race, breed ; now only used of dogs. M. E. strend 
— A.S sfrynd, stocksr^ry nan, to beget. 

59- His mountain sire. It has been proposed to read " his 
mighty sire," as in I. ii. 109. Theobald substituted '"mounting" 
in the sense of aspiring.— C\. Pr. Ed. 

67. The native . . . of him, the greatness he has inherited, 
and the destiny that awaits him. 

90. No . . . claim, no wrongful or perverse claim. Sinister 

literally means '' the left hand.'^ 

93. Line, pedigree, register of his descent. 

95. Willing you overlook, desiring you to look or read 
over. 

96. Evenly, directly, in a straight line. 

99. Indirectly, wrongfully. 

100. Challenger, claimant. 
127. In grant of, by granting. 

130. Womby vaultages, womb-like vaults. 



I40 NOTES. [act III. 

131. Chide, resound. 

155. Odds, variance, quarrel, 

139. The mistress court, the best tennis court. 

153. Breath, breathing-space, a very short time. 

ACT TH I RD. 

Prologue. 
I. With ixnagriri'd wing:, with the wing of imagination. 

4- Appointed, equipped. Hampton, that is, Southampton. 

5. Brave, gay, splendid. 
12. Bottoms, vessels. 
14- Kivage, shore. 

18. Grapple . . . navy, follow with your minds astern of this 
navy. 

30. To dowry, for a dowry. 

31. Some petty . . . dukedoms, Tulle, Limoges, and 
Aquitaine. 

33. Linstock, a stick to hold the gunner's match ; also spelt 
lintstock, from Dutch lontstok — lont^ a match (cf. Scotch lunt), and 
stok, a stick. Chambers, small pieces of ordnance. 

Scene i. 
10. Portage, porthole, used for the socket of the eye. 
ir. O'erwnelm, lower over. 

12. A galled rock, a rock worn away by the action of the 
water. 

13. Jutty, jut over. Confounded, wasted. 

21. For lack of argument, because they had no longer any 
foes to fight. 

22. Attest, testify, prove. 

31. Slips, a noose or leash in which greyhounds are held before 
they are allowed to start after the game. 

Scene 2. 

5. A case of lives, a set of lives, as we say " a case of pistols." 

21. Avaunt, begone. Fr. avan^, iorward— hat. ab^ from, ante., 
before. You cullions, you cowardly fellows. 

23. Duke, leader, general. Fr. dtic—'Lzx. duxy duels, a leader. 
Men of mould, mortal men. 

26. Bawcock, a term of endearment. Fr. beazi coq^ fine fellow. 

30. Swashers, swaggerers. 

33. Antics, oddities, buffoons. For, as for. 

34. White-livered, cowardly. 

45. Purchase, booty, originally anything acquired honestly or 
dishonestly, proceeds of begging or stealing. 



h 



sc. VI.] NOTES. 141 

50. Carry coals, a proverbial expression for " do the dirtiest 
work." 

54. Pocketing up of wrongs. Cf. our phrase, '' pocket an 
affront." 

65, Discuss, explain. 

88. GrOd-den, good evening. 

120. Liig, lie. A.S. liegan. Grund, ground, is the A.S. 

grund, pertiaps from grund-en^ pa.p. of grindan, to grind. 

122. Mary, by the Virgin Mary ; usually written " marry." 

Scene 3. 

2. Parle, parley, conference. 
8. Half achieved, half-won. 

11. Flesll'd, experienced in bloodshed. 

23. Precepts, summons. It has this meaning in Shakespeare 
only when the accent is on the last syllable. 

25. Of, on. 

2Q. Heady, headstrong. 

Scene 5. 

Q. But bastard Normans an allusion to the base birth of 
William I., the Conqueror.— C. Ed. 

12. Slobbery, sloppy, wet, marshy. 

13. Nook-shotten. This contemptuous term may refer to the 
irregular outlme of Britain, projecting into capes, shooting into 
nooks or angles. Knight interprets it as " the isle thrust into a 
corner, apart from the rest of the world." 

14. Mettle. This is the same word as "metal," but used in a 
figurative sense. 

17. Sodden, boiled. 

18. Drench, a drink, or draught of physic. Sur-rein'd, over- 
ridden. 

22. Roping, hanging like ropes. 

35. More sharper. Shakespeare uses both double compara- 
tives and superlatives for the sake of greater emphasis. 

57- For achievement, in order to bring matters to a head or 
end, to end the war. Fr. achever—chef^ the head. 

Scene 6. 

26. Buxom, lively, sprightly. It literally means "yielding," 
from A. S. bugan, to bow. 

41. He hath stolen a pax. The pax or pix was a small plate 
containing a picture of the crucifixion or of the Saviour, on which 
the kiss of peace (hence its name) was bestowed in the Romish 
Church at the time of mass. 

58. Fico or figo. " The use of this contemptuous word was 
accompanied by an insulting gesture, in which the thumb was 
thrust between the first and second fingers and the hand closed." 



142 NOTES. [act III. 

60. The fig of Spain. Poisoned figs are said to have been 
used in Spain for purposes of revenge, 

72. They will learn you, they will learn, look you. " You " 
is redundant. 

74. Sconce, an earthwork or fortification. Used also for the 
head, 

77. Con, learn by heart. 

92. -From the bridge, concerning the bridge. 

120. Habit, the uniform of a herald. 

131. Upon our cue, for our turn to act has come. " Cue," a 
term of the stage, denoting "• the last words of aii actor's speech 
serving as a hint to the next speaker." O.Fr. coe^ queue (Fr. guetie^. 
Lat, Cauda, a tail. 

146. duality, "profession," " rank," in Shakespeare's time the 
technical term for the profession of an actor. 

151. Impeachment, in its literal sense of " hindrance.'" O. Fr. 
empescher (Fr. e7nfiecher), to hinder — Low Lat. ivtpedicare, to 

fetter. To say the sooth, to speak the truth. Sooth from A. 

S. soodh, truth. 

171 Fare, M. E. faren—K.'S>. faran^ to go; cog. with Ger. 
fahren, Gr. poreuo. From the same root are far, ford^ fiord, 
Jlrth, fer-ry, ex-per-ience, ex-per-\ment,per-i\, etc. 

Scene 7. 

9. Provided of, where we would say "provided with." 

13. Pasterns, the part of a horse's foot from the fetlock to the' 
hoof. 

14^ As if his entrails were hairs. The reference is to ten- 
nis-balls, which were stuffed with hair. 

15. Pegasus, the winged horse of the Muses. 

18. The pipe of Hermes, the shepherd's pipe invented by 
the god Mercury, the Hermes of the Greeks. 

22. Perseus, who slew Medusa, from whose blood Pegasus 
sprung. 

23. The dull elements, etc., in allusion to the old theory 
that there were only four elementary substances, air, fire, earth, 
and water. 

34. The lodging, the lying down. 

42. "Writ, as well as wrote, is thus used by Shakespeare. He 
also has zvrote for -written. 

52. Belike, likely, perhaps, 

53. A kern, a light-armed soldier. 

54. Strait strossers, tight trowsers, 

63. A many. This use of " a " some explain by a reference to 
the'old noun ^' many," as it occurs in IV. lii. 95, " A many of our 
bodies," and in Sonnet 93 : '' In many's looks." It may also be 
explained by regarding the many collectively as one mass. Thus we 
say : '* a few," " a score," etc. 



sc. I.] NOTES. 143 

77. Go to hazard, play at dice. 

91. Still, always, 

104, Hooded. . . . bate. The reference is to hawking. The 
falcon, which was kept "hooded "till the game appeared, would 
sometimes hesitate in its flight, and " bate or flap its wings. 

141. Just, just so. Sympatllise, are in harmony with, 

resemble. 

142. Robustious, boisterous and violent. 

146. Siire"wdly out of beef, sorely in want of beef. 



ACT FOURTH. 

Prologue. 

1. Entertain conjecture of, imagine. 

2. The poring- dark, the darkness through which it is neces- 
sary to look intently or closely. 

8. Paly, pale. 

9. Battle, army in battle array. TJmber'd, darkened with 

the shadows cast by the flames. " Umber," a brown pigment, so 
;alled because originally obtained from Umbria in Italy. 

12. Accomplishing-, arming completely. 

20. Tardy-g-aited, slow-pacing. 

23. Watchful fires, the fires by which they watch. 

39- Attaint, the force of weariness. 

45. Mean and g-entle, high and low. Mean^ properly of 
niddle rank. Gentle^ of good birth. 

47- Little touch, brief sketch. 
50. Foils, swordsmen. 

Scene i. 
7. Husbandry, thrifty management. 

10. Dress us fairly, prepare ourselves aright. 

15. Churlish, rude. Churls an ill-bred fellow, from A. S.ceorl^ 
\ countryman. Cf . Scotch carl; Ger. Karl. 

16. liikes me, pleases me. 

23. Casted slough, refers to the cast-off skin of a snake. 

Legerity, nimbleness, activity — Fr. legerete — Uger^ light. 

26. Anon, immediately. M. E. forms anon., anoon., onan — AS. 
m ««jlit. " in one (instant)." 

27. Desire them all (to come) to, etc. 
33. I -would, I wish, I would have. 
38. Discuss, explain. 

39- Popular, vulgar. This was the meaning it bore in the time 
)f Shakespeare. 

46. Imp, lit. a graft or shoot ; then a child. The word has now 
jecome degraded in meaning. 



144 NOTES. [act IV. 

56. Saint Davy's day. March 1, the festival of St. David, the 
titular saint of Wales. — C. Ed. 

62. God be with you. This contraction becomes God be ivi'' 
ye., then good-bye. 

64. Sorts, agrees. 

67. Admiration, wonder. 

99. Sand, sandbank. 

105, The element, the sky. 

113. Possess him with, impart to him. 

121. By my troth. Cf the modern expression, " Upon my 

word." Troth, merely another form of truth. 1 will speak 

my conscience, I will speak what I know within my own 
mmd. 

J 44. Rawly, without due provision being made for them. 

152. Sinfully miscarry, perish in their sins. 

157. Irreconciled, not atoned for, unforgiven. 

165. Arbitrement, decision. 

173. Native punishment, the law of the land. 

175. Beadle, messenger to bring them to justice, court-officer. 

180. Unprovided, unprepared for death. 

194. Answer it, answer for it. 

205. An elder-g-un, a toy gun, the barrel of which is made 
from a piece of an elder-tree branch, by pushing the pith out 
of it. 

211. Something- too round, somewhat too plain spoken. 

220. The introduction of the incident of the '^' glove" into this 
scene is on a parallel with the affair of Portia's " ring." 

199. Enow, the same word as enough. 

249. General, public. 

255. Thy soul of adoration, the thing in thee for which thou 
art adored. 

264. Blown, the pa.p. of the verb bloiv, to bloom or blossom. 

272. Inter- tissued, inwoven with gold thread or pearls.— CI . 
Pr. Ed. 

273. The farced title, the title stuffed or crammed with showy 
terms, as His Most Gracious Majesty., etc. 

280. Distressful) earned by stress or dint of hard toil ; or it 
may describe the coarse bread eaten by the peasant. 

285. Hyperion = Phoebus or Apollo, who drives the chariot 
of the sun. 

292. Wots, knows. The past is wist. 

294. Advantagres, benefits. The verb is singular through the 
attraction of the singular noun "peasant," which is nearer to it 
than its own subject. Some instances where the verb in -j agrees 
with a subject in the plural, are explained by the northern English 
inflection -s of the third person plural. Cf . My old bones aches," 
" the imperious seas breeds monsters," and " his tears runs down". 

304. Compassing, obtaining. 



sc. III.] NOTES. 145 

316. Since . . . pardon, since my own repentance is neces- 
sary for forgiveness. 

Scene 2. 

3. Varlet is another form of valet, also vaslet, a diminutive of 
O. Fr. vassal., an attendant on a lord, a footman. It is now gener- 
ally applied to a low fellow. 

14. Dout, that is, do out, put out, extinguish. Cf. don., (i^fjr, 
dzip. 

23. Shales is a doublet of shells^ and allied to scale., skull, 
scalp., scallop. 

25. Curtle-axe, a short sword. 

33. Hilding-. Skeat derives this word from the older English 
hilderling, or hinderling, as if from hinder, the comparative of the 
adjective kind, with the meanmg of base, degenerate. 

35. Speculation has here its literal meaning of " looking on." 
from Lat. specie, I look. 

39. The tucket-sonance, the sounding of the tucket, the in- 
troductory flourish of the trumpet. 

45. Curtains, banners. 

48. Beaver, the front part of a helmet. 

52. Down-ropingr, dripping. 

53. The gimmal-bit, the double or chain bit. 

58. Battle, army. 

64. Gruidon, banner. 

65. Trumpet, trumpeter. 

Scene 3. 

2. Hode, for ridden. 

28. Yearns, grieves. 

42. This day, etc. The battle of Agincourt was fought on the 
25th of October, 1415, the festival of St. Crispin. 

52. With advantages, with exaggeration. " The story will 
lose nothing in the telling" (Wright). 

59. Crispin Crispian. Crispinus and Crispianus were two 
Christians who suffered martyrdom under Diocletian, at Soissons, 
in France, either in 287 or in 303. As during their missionary 
labors they had exercised their trade of shoemaking, they ever 
afterwards were regarded as the patron saints of this handicraft. 

65. Gentle his condition, make a gentleman of him. 

71. Bravely, finely, splendidly. 

72. Expedience, expedition, haste. 

94. Achieve me, put an end to my life, kill me. 
no In relapse of mortality, '' by a rebound of deadliness " 
(Schmidt). " In thy process of falling again into death . " 
133. Vaward, vanguard. 



146 NOTES. [act IV. 

Scene 4. 

4. Callino, Castore me ! This scrap of Pistol's turns out to 
be the name of an old Irish song. The English of it is, probably, 
young girl, my treasure ! 

8. Perpend, consider. 

9. DFox, the cant term for a sword, from the figure of a fox 
being stamped ont he blade as the cutler's mark. 

13. Moy. Pistol imagines the Frenchman is speaking of 
moidores. 

14. B>im, the diaphragm, 

28. Firk him, and ferret him. Firk^ to give a drubbing, 
to beat. Ferret, to throttle or worry as a ferret would a rabbit. 

73. This roaring devil i' the old play. The devil fre- 
quently figured as one of the characters in the old moralities and 
mystery plays, and with the "Vice" created amusement for the 
spectators. The "• Vice " (the original of the clown) would often 
belabor him soundly with a lath and send him roaring off the 
stage. 

74. A wooden dagger, with which the " Vice " would attempt 
to pare the devil's nails. 

Scene 6. 

8. Larding-, garnishing, fattening. The duke of York was very 
corpulent. 

35. Issue, water, shed tears. 

Scene 7. 

58. I was not ang-ry = I have not been angry. 

64. Skirr away, scour or scud away. 

72. Fin'd, pledged to pay as a fine. 

77. Book, register in a book. 

79. "Woe the while, woe to the time. While is here in the 
dative case. 

no. Wear the leek upon Saint Tavy's Day. In honor of 
a victory won by Prince Arthur over the Saxons, the Welsh sol- 
diers were enjoined by St. David, their patron saint, to wear a leek 
in their caps, as the skirmish had been fought "■ in a garden where 
leeks did grow." St. David's Day is the ist of March. 

149. A Jack-sauce, a saucy jack, an impudent fellow. 

162. When Alencon and myself, etc. " The king that dale 
shewed himselfe a valiant knight, albeit almost felled by the duke 
of Alanson ; yet with plaine strength he slue two of the dukes 
companie, and felled the duke himselfe." (Holinshed.) 

Scene 8. • 

9. 'Sblood, God's blood; it was used as an oath. Cf. zotmds 
or ^swounds. God's wounds. 



11.] NOTES. 147 



ACT FIFTH. 

Prologue. 

10. Pales in, hems in. 

12. "Wliifla.er 'fore tlie king-. A whiffler, originally a " fifer " 
or " lute-player," then "■ a person who preceded a procession to 
clear the way." 

17. The construction here is = '' to have his bruised helmet, etc., 
borne before him." 

21. Sigrnal and ostent, external signs of honor. 

30. Tile general of our g-racious empress, Robert Dever- 
eux, Earl of Essex, the favorite of Queen Elizabeth. In the spring 
of the year 1509, he was sent to Ireland with a large force to sup- 
press Tyrone s rebellion. But in this he failed, and returned to 
London in the following September. 

32. Broached, spitted, pierced through ; from Fr. broche, an 
iron pin. 

38. The emperor's coming, the emperor is coming. This 
was Sigismund, elected emperor of Germany in 1410. 
43. Rememhering-, reminding. 

Scene i. 

5. Scald, scurvy. 

21. Bedlam, mad ; a common name for a lunatic asylum, taken 
from Bethlem Hospital, London, which has existed for centuries. 

23. Parca's fatal web Parc(e was the name given in ancient 
mythology to the three weird sisters, the Fates. 

31. Cadwallader, the last king of the Welsh. He lived about 
the year 660, 

80. Gleeking: and galling, jeering and scoffing. 
85. Condition, temper, disposition. 

87. The huswife, the jilt. 

88. Spital is a contraction of " hospital," and in this form is 
common as a local name. 

Scene 2. 

The conference at Troyes was held m 1420, five years after Henry 
landed at Dover in triumph from France ; so Shakespeare has 
omitted the campaign of 1417-18, in which Rouen suffered a terrible 
siege, and Normandy was reduced. 

I- Wherefore = for which. 

17. Basilisks. A basilisk was a fabulous serpent, called also 
cockatrice, which was supposed to kill by its look. It was also a 
kind of ordnance. 

31. Congreeted, greeted each other. 

33. Bub, hindrance. 



148 NOTES. Ikqi:\. 

42. Even-pleach'd, intertwined so as to have a smooth or 
even appearance. 

47. Dt-racinate such savagery, root up such ^N'\\6. erowth. 

48. Erst, formerly : A.S. ceresi^ superlative of tzr, before. 
52. Kecksies, a kind of hemlock. 

63. Reduce, in its literal sense, to bring back. 
65. Let, hindrance, obstacle. To let, to hinder, occurs in the 
Bible. 
68. "Would, wish, desire. 

73. Enschedul'd, written down in a schedule, in writing. 
77. Cursorary, cursory, hasty. 

qi. Consigrn, with its literal meaning, sign together. 
97. Capital, chief. 

139. XTudid, would undo. 

140. Measure, metre. 
146. Buffet, box. 

161. Uncoined constancy, constancy that has not been tam- 
pered with. 

193. Saint Denis, Dionysius, the patron saint of France. 

245. Broken music, music from different instruments not in 
harmony . 

276. Nice customs court'sy, prudish customs bow or give 
way. 

278. List, barrier. 

297. Condition, disposition. 

339. Paction, compact— CI. Pr. Ed. 



EXAMINATION PAPERS. 



1. What contrast has Shakespeare drawn between the French 
and English armies on the eve of the battle of Agincourt ? 

2. What are the allusions to Scotland in the play ? 

3. Comment on these passages : 

{a) Consideration, like an angel, came, and whipped the offend- 
ing Adam out of him. 
{b) The air, a chartered libertine, i« still. 

{c) He's in Arthur's bosom, if ever man went to Arthur's bo- 
som. 'A made a finer end, and went away an it had 
been any cristom child. 
{d) 'Tis a hooded valor, and when it appears it will bate. 
(e) The farcM title running 'fore the king. 
{/) So that the art and practic part of life 
Must be the mistress to this theoric : 
Which is a wonder, how his grace should glean it, 
Since his addiction was to courses vain : 
His companies unlettered, rude, and shallow. 

4. Briefly remark upon some of the grammatical peculiarities in 
Shakespeare, and quote instances of them from this play. 

5. Explain : The roaring devil V the old play : for he hath stolen 
aj>ax^ and hanged ?nust a^ be. 

B. 

1. What was the nature of Henry V.'s claim to the throne of 
France, and what special motive had he in asserting it at the com- 
mencement of his reign ? 

2. How far does this play illustrate the state of home affairs in 
the early part of Henry V.'^s reign ? 

3. Describe the dying scene of Falstaff . 

4. By whom and of whom were these lines spoken ? Explain the 
allusions :— 

{a) France hath in thee found out 

A nest of hollow bosoms. 
{b) A good soft pillow for that good white head 

Were better than a churlish turf of France. 

(c) And 'a babbled of green fields. 

(d) Thou that didst bear the key of all my counsels. 
\e) And a true lover of the holy church. 

149 



I50 EXAMINATION PAPERS. 

if) We do not mean the coursing snatchers only. 
{g) The king himself will be a clipper. 
5. Quote instances where Shakespeare plays upon words. 

C. 

1. Give the reference in the play which partly determines the 
date of its production. 

2. Explain the following phrases: So idly king'd : King Lewis 
his satisfaction ," a many 0/ our bodies ; nve speak tipon our cue ; on 
poi7it 0/ fox : that nook-shotten isle ; this ivoodeti O : that is my 
rest. 

3. Explain the allusions in these passages :— 

(«) The law Saliqu^ that they have in France. 
(3) To kill us here in Hanipton. 
(c) This day is called the Feast of Crispian, 
(rf) O not to-day, think not upon the fault 

My father made in compassing the crown. 
ie) But taken and impounded as a stray 

The king of Scots. 
(/) The emperor's coming in behalf of France. 

4. In what sense does Shakespeare use these words ? Give in- 
stances: Enlarge : flesh'' d : argument : husbandry : rtib; trumpet; 
she : hilding : quick : consign : let : shog ; bottom : condition : bat- 
tle; instance. 

5. Explain: Tike, linstock ; giiriinal bit ; curtle-axe ; cursorary ; 
buxotn; rivage ; sternage ; pax ; xvhiffler ; corporal ; ancient. 



1. Trace the whole course of Henry's expedition, and give a 
short account of the state of things at the court of France. 

2. Sketch the character of Fluellen. 

3. What was a chorus ? To what extent has Shakespeare em- 
ployed it in King Henry V. ? 

4. Paraphrase, and add brief notes explaining the allusions : — 

(«) Can this cockpit hold 

The vasty fields of France ? or may we cram 

Within this wooden O the very casques 

That did affright the air at Agincourt ? 

O, pardon ! since a crooked figure may 

Attest in little place a million ; 

And let us, ciphers to this great accompt, 

On your imaginary forces work. 
{b) While that the armM head doth fight abroad, 

The advised head defends itself at home ; 

For government, through high and low and lower, 



EXAMINATION PAPERS. 151 

Put into parts, doth keep in one consent ; 
Congreeing in a full and natural close, 
Like music. 
(<:) In answer of which claim, the prince our master 
Says that yoM savor too much of your youth, 
And bid you be advis'd there's nought in France, 
That can be with a nimble galliard won ; 
You cannot revel into dukedoms there. 
He therefore sends you, meeter for your spirit. 
This sum of treasure ; and in lieu of this 
Desires you let the dukedoms that you claim 
Hear no more of you. 
5. Give the derivation and Shakesperean meaning of these words : 

A chieve : afficttice : exhale ; deracinate ; invention ; proportions ; 

puissance : resolved: security : speculation; vaward : timbered : 

legerity. 



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